Newsmakers May, 2018

Staff additions, changes and promotions at Texas newspapers.

Sean McCrory
Denton Record-Chronicle
DENTON – Sean McCrory has joined the Denton Record-Chronicle newsroom as its executive editor.
He succeeds Managing Editor Scott Parks, who retired March 30.
In announcing the appointment, Publisher Bill Patterson said he was impressed with McCrory’s varied experience working in different editorial positions at papers of many sizes. 
He came to Denton from upstate New York, where he was formerly executive editor of Messenger Post Media, a group of news websites, weekly publications and a six-day daily newspaper in Canandaigua, a town of 10,000 about 90 miles east of Buffalo.
Not a stranger to Texas, his first journalism was in Beaumont following graduation from the University of Florida in 1991. The Beaumont Enterprise hired him as a copy editor and eventually promoted him to news editor. 
He returned to Florida in the late 1990s, working primarily at The Gainesville Sun over the next decade but also at news outlets in Louisiana and New Braunfels, before moving to New York.
He and his wife Cat have five adult children. The move to Denton brings them closer to extended family members in Texas and Louisiana.

J.B. SMITH
Waco Tribune Herald
WACO - J.B. Smith has been promoted to managing editor of the Waco Tribune-Herald, Editor Steve Boggs announced.
Smith, 47, is a 20-year veteran of the Tribune-Herald newsroom and was named 2018 Star Reporter of the Year by the Texas Associated Press Managing Editors.
Smith will manage a staff of eight full-time reporters to develop local news coverage each day.
“I’ve benefited from great mentors over the years, and I’m fortunate to work with a talented staff,” Smith said. “Together we’re going to work to produce journalism that matters and continue to set the standard for accuracy and context in news reporting.”
Smith is a native of Sulphur Springs. He holds a bachelor’s degree in English from Southwestern University and started his career at the Williamson County Sun before joining the Tribune-Herald in 1997. He and his wife, Bethany, live in Waco and have two children.