Norma V. Lugar This is Me

Education

 View all 31 references Web References

1. 1. www.theroanoker.com

   www.theroanoker.com/features/j - [Cached]

   Published on: 3/9/2008   Last Visited: 3/9/2008

   by Norma Lugar

2. 2. theroanoker.com

   theroanoker.com/bestof/people/ - [Cached]

   Published on: 3/16/2007   Last Visited: 3/16/2007

   Norma Lugar, Leisure Publishing

3. 3. Prime Living -artist

   www.primeliving.net/archives/2 - [Cached]

   Published on: 2/1/2005   Last Visited: 5/8/2007

   Norma Lugar: Writing by the rules, but from the heart
   ...
   At 70, Lugar is still writing and editing stories and receiving awards for it.She has won more than 150 awards in her career.
   
   "If I don't win, then I don't think it's good enough," she says.
   
   Lugar has been part of The Roanoker magazine, owned by Leisure Publishing of Roanoke, for much of its 29 years.For more than a year, she also has been editor of its Pinnacle Living publication.
   
   Last year, Lugar was chosen as Communicator of Achievement by the Virginia Press Women, which meant she represented the best of her profession, her service to her organization and to her community.
   
   In addition to the Communicator honor, Lugar won a first place award from the National Federation of Press Women in "Special Articles, Social Issues," for "Confessions of an OxyContin Addict," a two-part series published in The Roanoker.She also won second place for a television commercial.
   
   These awards were in addition to a first place, business and financial writing, and third place, features, in the VPA state competition.
   
   It's impossible to peg Lugar to any particular category of writing, as her awards demonstrate.
   
   Her regular contributions to The Roanoker range from nostalgic pieces to heart-wrenching news features, such as drug addiction.In Pinnacle Living, she focuses on upscale homes and lifestyles in eight states.
   
   Still, the stories she likes most are those that have the potential to change lives, she said.
   ...
   But Lugar says she also relies on good research and the basic rules of writing to propel her through a story."I sit down and beat my head against the wall.I've had maybe two stories in my career that wrote themselves for me."
   
   She said the subject of her writing does not make any difference in the effort she puts into a story because she always tries to "do it like 'SMA' taught us."
   
   "SMA" was Sister Mary Agnes Brand, who ran the Seton Journal and taught journalism at the College of Mount Saint Joseph in Cincinnati, Ohio, where Lugar graduated.
   
   "SMA taught us to write everything as if you were going for a Pulitzer Prize," Lugar said."She was as competitive as hell."
   
   Lugar won her first writing award in 1956, from the Seton Journal for writing its showcase column, Journalulu.The Journalulu award sits on a table in her office.A clipping of a tribute written when Sister Mary Agnes died is stapled to a display board beside Lugar's desk.
   
   "It reminds me to always do my best," she said.
   
   First-generation born in America
   
   Lugar grew up surrounded by stories.
   ...
   The family lived first in Roanoke, but moved to Salem when Lugar was a teen-ager.
   
   Lugar now lives in Salem, in the same area where she grew up and graduated from Andrew Lewis High and attended Roanoke College before transferring to Mount Saint Joseph.Except for college and a couple of brief stints on Ohio newspapers, Lugar has stayed close to home.
   
   Her first job, as a staff writer with a Springfield, Ohio, newspaper, was typical for a female journalist in that period.
   ...
   After two years in Springfield, Lugar knew it was time to move to a larger publication.Logical next stops would have been Charlotte, Atlanta or Miami, but she wanted to come home.She was hired by The Roanoke Times for $70 a week.She had made $92 in Springfield, but she recalls then managing editor Norwood Middleton justifying the lower salary by saying he knew Lugar's father wouldn't charge her rent to live at home.
   
   Later, Lugar left the Roanoke Times to work briefly on the Cincinnati paper in a job she quickly learned to hate.She returned home and taught English in Roanoke County for a year before rejoining the Times.