Democrat-Gazette Seeks New D.C. Writer

A Google Street View image of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette building in Little Rock (© Google)

After naming Washington correspondent Frank Lockwood as its religion editor once again, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette Managing Editor Eliza Gaines told Whispers last week that the newspaper would not be letting the job go fallow in the nation’s capital.

“We are currently searching for a Washington bureau reporter to replace Frank,” Gaines said by email. Lockwood, who hired on at the Little Rock paper in 2006 as its religion editor, had been in Washington for six years and grew weary of the contentious politics.

“Covering Washington right now is like being in the middle of a bitter, ugly divorce,” he told his own paper. “In the old Washington, people could disagree with each other without demonizing each other.”

The Democrat-Gazette reported on Lockwood’s new/old assignment last week but mentioned no plans for a Washington replacement.

Francisca Jones, the paper’s current religion editor, will stay in that post until Lockwood takes over in late August. Jones’ husband, Gaines said, has taken a job out of state and she will be leaving the staff.

Lockwood is an interesting journalist, an Oregon native with an undergraduate degree from Harvard and a law degree from the University of Idaho. He is married to Aimie Lockwood, an attorney in Little Rock who kept up her practice, seeing Frank on his trips home or on frequent visits to D.C.

“Faith is incredibly important to a lot of Arkansans,” Lockwood said of the religion beat.

“It’s a topic that deeply matters. And Arkansas has a deep religious history that I look forward to writing about.”