Meet Stephen Babcock: an interview with our Technical.ly Lead Baltimore Reporter
We are back with our monthly internal Slack AMA series. In this series, one staff member answers questions from the rest of our team on our private team message service. Here we’ll share a short transcript of some of the questions and answers. This month, we interviewed Stephen Babcock.
Stephen is the Technical.ly Lead Reporter in Baltimore. Previously he was the managing editor of online news and culture publication NOLA Defender. Before his stint in New Orleans, Stephen was a reporter for the reporter the Rio Grande Sun of Northern New Mexico. He graduated from Northeastern University.
Q: Can you please tell us how you came to be a journalist?
A: I liked writing from early on and always wrote way more on elementary school assignments than was required. I had a feeling at 13 that I wanted to apply that writing to journalism. In high school, I discovered the NY Times and was further confirmed. I studied journalism in college and worked at papers and still loved it.
Q: How has it been moving to various cities throughout your career?
A: I've enjoyed moving around because spending every day somewhere for a long time is how you get to really know the place and what makes it tick. Transitions get easier over time, but it does get harder to leave groups of people.
Q: What's the most underserved beat in Baltimore that could use some new players?
A: I think someone should still track the port and industrial area more closely, despite the growth of other industries like tech. A lot happens there and it connects us to the rest of the world. I would call it the Broening Highway Beat if it were me.
Q: What is the best piece of musical art you've ever heard or experienced?
A: I only went to a Sunday second line in New Orleans the whole way through once, because they are long. So definitely that. It's a Sunday afternoon parade where you walk with the band and the whole neighborhood is out. From little kids to older guys, everyone is the best dancer or trying to prove it.
Q: What's your secret work/life hack you love and think more people should know or share? (for reporting or anything else)
A: Not really a hack but, if time and safety allow, always stay til the end of things, whether it's a party or public meeting or what have you. You learn stuff that way.
Q: What's a piece of knowledge or experience you learned or did that made you be all like 'I totally live in Baltimore for real now.'
A: In New Orleans it took a long time for me to get to the point where I learned that social networks (not online) were in part driven by the question, "where did you go to high school?" In Baltimore, I learned that pretty fast, but it's valuable to know as I can see it playing out in various ways.
Q: Favorite thing, reported or otherwise, you've ever written and why?
A: I always return to a piece I did for a paper that I wrote for in college. It was about guys who raced homing pigeons outside of Boston. I am open about the fact that I got the idea from a Susan Orlean piece in the New Yorker, but I really wanted to meet these guys. It was basically a tour through the backyard pigeon coups of Quincy, Mass., the surrounding area and the trailer by the docks where they met. There was a guy named Cappy. And I remember that another reporter told me that an editor who was always hard to impress liked the story. So I was proud of that.
Q: Favorite meat and why in at least 50 words?
A: perhaps not favorite but given the constraints this one has a story. in New Orleans, I used to live near a fried chicken place. Every day around the same time the whole area would smell like fried chicken because of some sort of exhaust deal they did. It was impossible not to want it, and the chicken was the best fried chicken I've had to date and I partook often. Maybe there have been better momentary meats, but because of the smell, it stands out as a favorite. is that 50?
Q: Since you’re a mover, where does your loyalty lie with sports? Which sports teams are your favorite?
A: Syracuse Orange college basketball, New Orleans Saints football, LSU Fighting Tigers football, Baltimore Orioles baseball and I love soccer but I struggle with supporting a team beyond USMNT.
