2001 Follies to Honor McMahan

Ron McMahan, former editor of the Knoxville Journal and press secretary for U.S. Senate majority leader Howard H. Baker Jr., will be honored at the Front Page Follies, May 19, 2001.

McMahan, who began as a copy boy, later covered beats ranging from city hall to police and politics and eventually became editor of the paper where he had been a copy boy.

Reporting career
McMahan’s career as an investigative reporter provided excitement early in his career. As a reporter for the Chattanooga Post, he wrote about wild parties where police officers fired guns as part of the celebration. The expose resulted in death threats to McMahan. The FBI investigated and found that the calls had come from police squad rooms.

As reporter for the Journal, he went undercover with a hidden camera and exposed all-night bootlegging establishments in Knoxville. This story influenced the passing of a referendum allowing sales of liquor by the drink.

McMahan also covered Senator Baker’s campaign for the U.S. Senate in which Baker upset a candidate known as “Largemouth” Bass and became the first popularly elected Republican senator from Tennessee.

Journal editor
After having served with Baker in Washington, McMahan returned to the Knoxville Journal as editor. The newspaper had been losing circulation 10 out of the 11 previous years. In three years, he made the Journal the fastest growing paper in the state, moving circulation from 52,000 to 65,000. He began the regular use of color photos ahead of many other papers, boosting single copy sales.

For a series with the Tennessean on the Butcher bank collapse, the Journal won several major journalism awards. In 1983, the TPA recognized the Journal as the best newspaper in the state. Under his leadership, Journal reporters undertook several investigations of public officials. These stories affected the careers of two safety directors, a school superintendent, an attorney general and a sessions court judge (who was taking home confiscated firearms).
He also ran a series on police brutality.

At the start of the 1986 football season, the Journal exposed the practice of UT football players’ selling tickets to games, leading a disgruntled fan to charter a plane to fly around Neyland Stadium calling on other fans to cancel their subscriptions.

McMahan appointed the Journal’s first female city editor and the first female UT football beat reporter. The latter appointment forced UT to create interview facilities that allowed both sexes equal access to players.

Press secretary
McMahan advised Baker throughout the Watergate hearings, chaired by Baker and Sam Ervin. He advised him on many other leading public policy issues and on national political campaigns.

Although retired, McMahan remains a close friend and political adviser to Senator Fred Thompson.