Montgomery worked six days a week, and seemingly all day and
all night. He called me at late o’clock to make changes to pages that had
already been changed and he called me at early o’clock to find out why the
papers were late in Truro.
His attention to detail was troubling but his feel for how
to play the big story unerringly precise. On the Sunday morning after the
Hillsborough disaster we pored over hundreds of images looking for the most
powerful pictures that would tell the story without being distasteful. He
didn’t shy away from disturbing but he knew from his experience at the News of
the World just what the readers couldn’t stomach.
He loved a poster front and powerful picture spread and all
this in pre-digital days. I was the man who had to load the slides into the
carousel the right way up first time round, a task I can still perform if ever
required.
I joined Today pre-launch as part of Shah’s vision to bring
bright young things from the provinces into the rough-tough world of national
newspapers.
Working
alongside the old hands - deep breath here - including Brian MacArthur, Jonathan
Holborrow, Jane Reed, Anthony Holden, Pat Pilton, Ron Morgans, Tessa Hilton, Ray
Cave and Len Gould was a fantastic education.
A
lot of us – including future editors Colin Myler, Amanda Platell, Nicola
Jeal and Geordie Greig – have a lot to thank Today for. And I have a lot to
thank David Montgomery for.
- An extract from ‘Six of the best’ which appears in the May 2012 issue of PressGazette
