A Tradition Continues…A One-of-a-kind Life in the Newspaper Business

This was the lead story on the first issue after Betty Weesner died in 2016, I thought this was going to be hard to write, but it was one of the easiest stories I had written for The Republican. Ten years later, I realize there are many of our subscribers who never had the pleasure to meet or the joy to work with Betty Jean. Here’s what you missed.

A local newspaper such as The Republican, can become part of the reader’s family. We know our subscribers and they know us. We celebrate with them, congratulate them, and mourn with them in a way no newspaper conglomerate can duplicate. It’s something that’s not taught in journalism classes, but something you learn on the job, the way Betty Jean Weesner did.

When Betty Weesner died on March 23, 2016, at the age of 90, many people lamented the end of an era. Betty Jean would have laughed and called that an unconfirmed rumor.

The Republican has continued to serve its readers and the Hendricks County community with the kind of local news that Betty Jean Weesner, her father, “Pug” Weesner, his predecessor, Julian D. Hogate, and a succession of publishers before them have provided for more than a century.

Betty Jean Weesner was a quiet influence, working to bring out the best in Hendricks County’s people and institutions. She encouraged people to strengthen their best qualities and help to build a better community. Yes, it’s been different without Betty Jean Weesner sitting at her desk, a twinkle in her eye, her quiet, but cutting, sense of humor and her crackling laughter.

When prodded to write about her life, Betty Jean would say there wasn’t much to write about. She would rather write the stories of the people in the community. That was news to her and the way the news will continue to be in The Republican.

Betty Jean Weesner had deep roots in Hendricks County and the newspaper business. Her great-grandfather, Jabin Weesner, a North Carolina Quaker, moved to Hendricks County in 1870, settling on a farm north of Clayton. Her grandfather, Harris F. Weesner, moved to California to seek his fortune, but returned to Hendricks County in 1898 to teach printing at the Indiana Boys School near Plainfield and later published a newspaper at Clayton..

Her father was Edward Jabin Weesner, who earned the nickname “Pug” for his pugalisting encounters while at Clayton High School. Pug began his newspaper career at the Rockville Republican. A girl and a linotype brought him to Danville, where he was hired by Julian D. Hogate at The Republican and on October 14, 1922, married Ruth L. Daugherty.

Betty Jean, their only child, was born January 22, 1926. In the fourth grade, she began her journalistic career, earning a dollar a week writing news from the elementary school. During high school, she covered sports for the paper, and was active in Girls’ Club and drama productions. She graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1944.

She attended her father’s alma mater, Indiana University, to study journalism. There were few women in the field and classmates asked her why she picked that subject. “I told them I was going to be the editor of my hometown newspaper,” she remembered. “They didn’t believe me.”

She got her first assignment as editor while she was still in college, overseeing the special edition of The Republican celebrating its 100th anniversary in 1947. In December of that year, she was driving back from Indianapolis when her car was struck by a coal truck and she was severely injured. She returned to her parents’ home to recover. That’s where she was when, in March of 1948, a devastating tornado struck Danville, demolishing the frame home. Betty Jean was still in a body cast, when the storm blew the bed over on top of her and her home nurse, saving them from serious injury.

Recovering from her accident, she returned to I.U., receiving her Bachelors degree in 1951. She immediately went to work at The Republican, as reporter and advertising salesman until 1969, when she became editor.

Betty Jean implemented some of the writing lessons she had learned at I.U. “Be brief,” she recalled her instructor insisting. “Make your stories like a woman’s skirt. Long enough to cover the subject, but short enough to be interesting.”

While those instructions came in handy, it was her father’s news philosophy that formed her doctrine for local news.

“When Lindbergh flew solo across the Atlantic, a man asked my father why there wasn’t something in the paper about it,” she would say, “and my dad said, ‘Lindbergh doesn’t live in Hendricks County and didn’t fly over Hendricks County.’”

During her long career, she touched many lives in many ways. She knew a family whose young son was struggling to improve his grades. When she noticed the boy’s name finally appeared in the honor roll, she pulled the family’s newspaper from the stack as they were being prepared for the post office. Turning to the page where the honor roll was printed, she circled the boy’s name and in the margin wrote: “At last!”

When many newspapers began to charge high fees to run obituaries, Betty Weesner continued to run obituaries at no cost, believing it to be a service to the residents and former residents who should be remembered for the contributions to their community.

Betty Jean Weesner’s contribution was to continue what her father and others before him had established, a local newspaper that cares, and will continue as her legacy for the future.