![]() Instead of taking notes on details he observes in the field, Stephenson sometimes asks interviewees to describe what they look like, or what they’re wearing. My interviews have become much more intimate." I haven’t realized how revealing people can be with their own word choices or the word that a person comes up with after a long pause. "And maybe I haven’t been listening to people well enough. "I used to have very, very few quotes in my stories, and now I use a lot of quotes, in part because I tape all my interviews," Stephenson says. He’s also relying on his ears to tell stories. "I’m not always able to see the stop signs or the electric signs so I have to use my ears." "I can see the cars well enough to wait before I cross the street," Stephenson says. On the familiar walk from his home to the bus stop, he can barely recognize the outlines of houses or patches of glistening ice on the sidewalk. He can’t drive anymore, so he uses the bus to get around town. Stephenson can no longer see the beads in a little girl’s hair, or describe a worn-out Milwaukee apartment building. Doctors say his vision will continue to deteriorate.Ĭrocker Stephenson uses a magnifying glass, an oversized monitor and special lights to help him read and write at his desk in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel newsroom. It’s causing his world to look like a series of vague shapes and patches of light and dark. ![]() Doctors cannot define the condition, but it’s similar to macular degeneration. "The most profound moments I’ve had as a journalist have been visual moments," Stephenson said.īut now, at 63, Stephenson is losing his sight. His hallmark is writing with rich description and revealing detail. He was sent to New York City in the aftermath of 9/11 and to Kosovo to cover the war in the late 1990s. Stephenson has covered crime, public health and an array of feature stories for the newspaper. "Ain't nothing to do but sit in the hallway till it stop," she says. ![]() The rain sweetens the air, but the lightless hallway in which the child sits is stuffy and sour. She has black beads woven into her braided black hair. She rests her chin on her knees, watching an early morning rain pour down on the street outside. What Stephenson found was a young girl contemplating the violence:Ī 12-year-old girl sits on a flight of green-carpeted steps just inside the doorway of a worn-out building. The purpose was to find out why four murders happened in one week in this neighborhood, an area not known for such violence. In 1996, Stephenson and Journal Sentinel photographer Gary Porter rented an apartment in a neighborhood on the city's northwest side for a month. For more than 30 years, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Crocker Stephenson has relied on the power of observation to paint pictures of city life. ![]()
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