Skip to main content

F ³: What Comes After

 



This is photojournalist Paul Gillespie.



From the Capital Gazette Website:

Paul W. Gillespie is an award-winning staff photojournalist for Capital Gazette with nearly 25 years telling the stories of Anne Arundel County with his camera. Through Paul's lens readers have seen Navy and high school sports, breaking news, features and community events. Paul has won numerous awards for his work, including dozens MDDC Press Association Awards. 

This is also Paul Gillespie:

Photojournalist recalls narrow escape from rampage: "I thought I was going to die", CBS News, July, 2018


Still shot taken from CBS News interview 

Gillespie made it outside the building and ran to a neighboring bank for help. After catching his breath, he called his wife.

"And I said, Jen, it's me. It's Paul. I'm okay… Somebody came into the Capital office and started shooting people. And it's real bad. And I can't talk long, but it's bad," he said.

To help cope with the tragedy, Gillespie is already getting back to work – all while keeping his colleagues in mind.

Gillespie is a victim of the June 28 shooting at the Capital Gazette newspaper in 2018. He was the only survivor. He is a victim because he carries with him the experience of that horrific day. That he survived is a miracle. But what comes after is a lifetime of trauma. 

Along with the staff of The Capital Gazette he has won a Pulitzer Prize Special Citation and was a Time magazine Person of the Year in 2018. 

Here’s his post on Instagram marking the memory of that day:

Today marks eight years since the tragedy in our Capital Gazette newsroom.

A gunman shot his way into our office killing Wendi Winters, Rob Hiaasen, Gerald Fischman, Rebecca Smith and John McNamara. A shotgun blast came within inches of me, nearly took my head off.

It changed the lives of so many.

I shot and produced this video last year. It briefly recounts that horrific day for me.

More importantly it talks about our five Capital Gazette members we lost that day.

The lives changed of those left behind.

The importance of local journalists doing the best jobs they can to make our communities better places. And my Journalists Matter: Faces of the Capital Gazette project.

It is a bit long at 24 minutes. I feel every second I left in the final cut is important.

I love our community. The people that rallied by us after that day. How the tragedy brought us together. It should not take a tragedy to make us love our neighbors.

Support local journalists, photojournalists.

Never forget Rob, Wendi, John, Gerald and Rebecca.

Press On!

Be Kind.



Capital Gazette Family Remembered/Journalists Matter 


What comes after will never be “back to normal.” Trauma changes you. Your life becomes The Horror plus all the subsequent relived horrors. Flashbacks. Triggers. You live. You struggle. You survive. You are never the same.

To learn more about Paul Gillespie’s work and to support him buy purchasing human created photographic art, check him out on Instagram and visit his website. 


The print shop is open here at Paul Gillespie's Fine Art Photography and Other Curiosities. Thanks to all who support my art.

Buy local art. Support local artists, writers, photographers and musicians. Don't put that mass repro art on the walls, buy local.

Be Kind.




Mark your calendar now for Gillespie’s show in September at the Chesapeake Arts Center.




Village Green/Town² Comments 

Comments

  1. Julia A. McCreadyJuly 10, 2026 at 4:09 AM

    Please do not submit comments here. This function will be disabled shortly. Use the link above instead. Thanks!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Teacher Gifts

Today is the last day of school before the Winter Break. It’s a good time to remember the far-reaching nature of our public school system. You may not have children. You may have sent your children to independent schools. It matters not. You will be impacted one way or another. Yesterday I read a long thread on Facebook about several waves of illness in the schools right now. There’s influenza A and norovirus, I believe. And of course there’s COVID. Apparently in some individual schools the rate of illness is high enough for school admin to notify parents.  When I was little the acceptable holiday gift for a teacher was one of those lovely floral handkerchief squares. (I don’t know what it was for male teachers. They were rare in my elementary years.) These days the range of teacher gifts is wider and I have fond memories of Target gift cards which I have written about before. I think it’s safe to say that giving one’s teacher Influenza, norovirus, or COVID is not the ideal holiday...
1 comment
Read more

They Can Wait

This is not a typical Saturday post. That’s because, in my community, it’s not a typical Saturday.  Oakland Mills High School, after years of deferred repair, needs massive renovation. It’s pretty simple: when you don’t fix a problem it gets bigger. The school system itself said the the OMHS school building was  "no longer conducive to learning" back in 2018.  2018 .  But Thursday the Boad of Education voted to push it out of the lineup of important projects which will be given the go-ahead to proceed soonest.  In my opinion it’s a terrible decision and sets a dangerous precedent. To explain, here’s the advocacy letter I sent in support of Oakland Mills High School. I was rather proud of it. I am writing to ask you to proceed with needed renovation at Oakland Mills High School in the most timely and comprehensive manner humanly possible. I have read the letter sent to you by the Oakland Mills Community Association and I am in complete agreement. You are extremel...
1 comment
Read more

Columbia Chance Connection

  Last night, as my husband and I were about to sit down to dinner, our front door swung open and a cheery voice announced, “I’m ba—ack!”  We weren’t expecting anyone. Clearly the only people who’d walk right in to our house would be one of our offspring. I had my reading glasses on so I wasn’t seeing too clearly. It seemed too tall for our youngest, but we knew our eldest was at work. I took off my glasses to see a friendly but confused face scanning our living room. When her gaze landed on us we all had a sudden realization. We didn’t know eachother. “Oh I’m so sorry! I’m in the wrong house! My daughter just moved in and she needed hooks for the kitchen so I ran out to get them.” She waved the package. “All these houses look the same and I don’t know the neighborhood yet. I thought this was my daughter’s house.” We were all getting a bit giggly. “That’s okay. For a quick second we thought you were our daughter,” said my husband. I told her our names and said she should defin...
Post a Comment
Read more