Owen Cooper
JRNM 151

  • Scott Mahoney
    Scott Mahoney

As a child, Scott Mahony would get up every morning and run to go grab the latest edition of The Gazette from the driveway. Now, 20 years later, he gets to wake up every morning and work as a managing editor for the Medina newspaper he grew up reading as a teenager.
Early on in his childhood, Mahony aspired to become a novelist.
“I’ve always wanted to get a book published,” he said of dreams, which he still maintains today.
But it’s at Lorain County Community College, where he first fell in love with newswriting after joining an intro to journalism class. However, it was not always easy for Mahony because he was a shy and reserved student at first. That was until just a few weeks into the journalism class when then-President Barack Obama came to visit the school, and to his surprise, Mahony, who was a freshman at the time, was chosen to be the editor of The Collegian, the campus student newspaper. Up to this point, Mahony was actually “on the fence” about continuing journalism, but once he covered Obama’s visit, it completely shifted his thoughts. “It was chaos, but the feeling afterward made it worth it,” Mahony said about the assignment.
Since his days at LCCC, Mahony had written for newspapers including The Oberlin News- Tribune, The Morning Journal, and The Gazette.
Early on in his career Mahony covered high school sports, with wrestling being his favorite. Although, he will be the first to admit that he knew nothing about wrestling, and frankly, he didn’t like it at first. As he began to understand wrestling better as time went on, and it helped him to appreciate the sport.
Before Mahony joined The Gazette in August, he had taken two years off to be a stay-at-home dad, which he said he “wouldn’t trade for anything” as he was able to spend time with his two young daughters.
As a managing editor, Mahony wishes that his grandparents, whom he would read The Gazette with as a child, could see him now and what he’s accomplished in journalism.
Mahony is also a firm believer that the journalism industry is evolving at a fast rate with online publications becoming more prevalent, but he said that even with all of the change, journalism is not going anywhere, anytime soon.

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