Bob DeLong
named to newspaper Hall of Fame
Mapleton native Bob DeLong, who died in 2008, is among three veteran journalists who have been selected to join the Maine Press Association Hall of Fame.
DeLong, the late columnist Bill Clark and retired St. John Valley Times publisher Don Levesque will be inducted at ceremonies scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 16 at Point Lookout Conference Center in Northport as part of the MPA’s annual fall conference.
The Hall of Fame was established in 1998 to honor newspaper people with Maine connections who made outstanding contributions to the profession. The 2010 induction will bring the total number of Hall of Fame members to 52.
DeLong worked at the Bangor Daily News for 34 years, the last 22 as a staff photographer. He began his career with the News in 1968 as a typographer in the composing room, and then worked as a freelance photographer for United Press International in the 1970s. He moved into the photography department at the Bangor Daily News in 1980.
“He was always ready to tackle any story, any challenge,” wrote Bangor Daily News Photo Editor Scott Haskell. “Bob was interested in the people he met and photographed. He was a fountain of knowledge about Maine’s people and towns,” recalled Haskell, “and the issues that affected them.”
“Bob DeLong was the epitome of the professional news photographer,” said Mark Woodward, then-executive editor of the Bangor Daily News, in the newspaper’s story about DeLong’s death in the summer of 2008. “You could count on Bob to follow through on any assignment, and no matter how routine or challenging the shoot, he would bring back much more than you anticipated.”
In 2002, in the newspaper’s “Pictures of the Year” section, DeLong looked back on his career.
“Over the years,” he wrote, “the pages of the Bangor Daily News have given me the opportunity, through my photos, to tell stories, show happiness, sadness, accomplishment, failure, relief, despair and, I hope, to show readers something they might not have had time to see themselves.”
DeLong died in July of 2008.
The list of MPA Hall of Fame members is available at http://mainepress.wordpress.com/hall-of-fame/
