Macon Whoopee! NSNC 36th Annual Conference May 3 – 6

Nancy Grace is just one of many star performers in the lineup for this year’s conference. The program includes some veterans of the journalism profession, such as Tom Johnson, a former newspaper publisher and president of CNN; Jim Wootten, retired Atlanta Journal-Constitution political columnist; and Charles Richardson, editorial page editor of The (Macon) Telegraph. They’ll be joined by some new age pacesetters like Erick Erickson, editor of RedState.com, and Tim Regan-Porter, director of Mercer University’s Center for Collaborative Journalism, who will draw on his success as co-founder of Paste Magazine to lead a seminar on social and digital media.

One of the more entertaining speakers will be Southern humorist Lauretta Hannon of Atlanta, and we’ll hear from Tommy Tomlinson of the Charlotte Observer, one of the South’s best known columnists.   NSNC’s own Suzette Martinez Standring, fresh from an engagement as a presenter for the Erma Bombeck Writer’s Workshop, will teach us all about “A Writer’s Meditation.”

You’ll also get to go face-to-face with another familiar byliner, Gail Collins of the New York Times, who will receive the 2012 Ernie Pyle Lifetime Achievement Award at a Saturday night dinner in Macon’s historic Hay House.

See a full conference schedule at the NSNC website www.columnists.com. While you’re there, sign up for “Macon Whoopee” before it’s too late. You can also reserve your hotel room at the same time.