Detroit Free Press Newspaper

There's a new chapter being written in the Cult of Celebrity handbook -- one with no spoiled athletes, playgirl heiresses or adulterous movie stars involved. It's taking place in the unlikely world of newspapers, a field with so few national superstars that it is usually hard-pressed to come up with a decent scandal. True, there were the Stephen Glass and Jayson Blair affairs. But they were just promising up-and-comers, unknown to the general public until they went bad.

The media world has been abuzz for most of this month about the phony column that Mitch Albom, the bestselling author, wrote for the Detroit Free Press. Although Albom clearly screwed up and should be punished, I've been stunned by the level of outrage directed at him. Nothing less than a public beheading would seem to satisfy some of his critics.

Mitch Albom, the bestselling author and longtime sports columnist for the Detroit Free Press, will resume writing for the paper and will not be fired for having written a column describing events that didn't happen, the paper announced Saturday in a Page 1 "Letter to Readers."

Gannett Co., the nation's largest newspaper company, is buying the Detroit Free Press from Knight Ridder Inc. and MediaNews Group Inc. will take ownership of the Detroit News from Gannett, the companies announced Wednesday. Gannett and Knight Ridder also announced an exchange of newspapers in Florida, Washington and Idaho. Terms of the transactions were not disclosed. Gannett is buying the Tallahassee Democrat in Florida from Knight Ridder.

In a major victory for unions involved in one of the nation's highest-profile labor disputes, a federal administrative law judge ordered Detroit's two newspapers to give more than 1,000 striking workers their jobs back. Judge Thomas Wilks, in a decision released Friday by the National Labor Relations Board, upheld most of the unfair labor practice complaints brought by the six unions against the Detroit News and Detroit Free Press in the nearly 2-year-old clash.

Detroit Newspapers Inc. said it will respond this week to an offer by 2,000 striking union members to return to work. Six unions made an offer Friday designed to help Detroit Free Press and Detroit News workers reclaim jobs they left in July 1995 in a strike about pay, work rules and other issues. The newsroom workers union, Newspaper Guild Local 22, approved the plan by a 60% margin Sunday after a sometimes heated meeting. The guild was the only union that required rank-and-file approval.

Leaders of the unions on strike for 19 months against Detroit's two main daily newspapers made an unconditional offer Friday to return to work, calling it a legal maneuver, not a surrender or end to the strike. But company executives said that if all six striking unions follow through on the unconditional offer, the strike would be over. "They can't have it both ways," said Susie Ellwood, vice president of Detroit Newspapers Inc. "It's sort of like being slightly pregnant.

Detroit's two main daily newspapers accepted a back-to-work offer from their striking employees Wednesday, ending a bitter 19-month walkout that divided one of America's staunchest union towns. But the dispute appeared far from over. Union leaders charged that the newspapers' plan to rehire employees as openings become available amounts to a rejection of their back-to-work offer.

Three days after Rep. Barbara-Rose Collins (D-Mich.) was ousted by the voters, the Detroit Free Press apologized on its front page Friday for misquoting the black congresswoman as saying "I hate" the white race. Collins had been quoted as saying: "All white people, I don't believe are intolerant. That's why I say, 'I love the individuals, but I hate the race.' " But she actually said: "All white people, I don't believe are intolerant.