2016 news highlights: Heath Harrison
Print and online editors choose their highlights of 2016
It was US election day and with the stunning result confirmed, we were waiting – like newsrooms the world over – for Donald Trump to claim victory so we’d have a front page picture for the next day’s paper.
As we waited and deadlines edged closer, Newcastle-Hunter group managing editor Chad Watson and I started thinking about other options, and soon we were talking about a spinoff of the famous Obama “Hope” poster. Within a couple of minutes, we had a headline and then an artist, Josh Hall, on the job. Josh nailed it, and by the time Trump had emerged for his victory speech (early evening, Australian time), we had what we thought was a pretty cool front cover. We posted it on Twitter and Facebook, where it took off, with shares, likes, retweets, praise and criticism.
Our page ended up appearing in The Washington Post and the BBC alongside some of the most famous mastheads in the world to show how the world’s newspapers reacted to Trump’s shock victory.
- Heath Harrison, editor, Newcastle Herald
