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Three longtime Nevada journalists — the late Lisa Kim Bach, Associated Press sports columnist Tim Dahlberg, and veteran Las Vegas editor Don Ham — were inducted Saturday night into the Nevada Newspaper Hall of Fame.
Lisa Kim Bach
A 1989 graduate in journalism and English from California State University, Fresno, Lisa Kim Bach started her career at the Modesto Bee, then the Clovis Independent, Fresno Bee and the News Sentinel in Fort Wayne, Ind., before joining the Las Vegas Review-Journal as a reporter in 1997.
Her byline appeared more than 2,000 times in the Review-Journal.
She won many awards from the Nevada Press Association over the years, including the 2007 Community Service award when she led a team covering Clark County’s troubled Department of Family Services.
“A series of stories that touched the heart of a community,” a contest judge wrote. “It shows why this is an issue that matters to the reader, on a broad number of stories that take us beyond the investigations of a blue-ribbon panel to the overcrowded emergency shelters for children victims of neglect and abuse. By getting her hands on censored material, reporter Lisa Kim Bach sheds light on how a system failed to protect those that needed it most.”
After she moved to assistant city editor in 2008, her work on the education beat continued to inform readers and guide reporters.
“She was passionately engaged in her craft and expected the same from others,” wrote Carri Geer Thevenot. “If others weren’t quite at that point, she’d coax them there through example and direct inspiration.”
Born in Korea to an Army father and his Korean wife, Lisa grew up on a farm in Kentucky, then came West with her family for college. Her 27-year journalism career was cut short when she died from cancer in April 2016.
“The newsroom was filled with laughter on her shift.” remembered Jane Ann Morrison. “Loud, hearty laughter, which if bottled could lighten any office. And there was chocolate in a jar on her desk. Everyone was welcome to grab some. Laughter and chocolate were her cures.”
— from the nomination
Tim Dahlberg
Tim Dahlberg’s first job in journalism was at the Sparks Tribune, where he worked as reporter, sports editor, photographer, bottle washer and sometimes deliveryman. A student at the University of Nevada at the time, he told the editor he would work for free for the experience and he almost did, getting paid $38 to put in 20 hours a week.
He moved to the Las Vegas Review-Journal in 1976, beginning as a night police reporter where he wrote about crimes that included the murder of Culinary Union leader Ed Hanley. He later worked as investigative reporter and political columnist for the state’s biggest newspaper.
Dahlberg was among the first on the scene of the 1980 MGM Grand fire that killed 87 people, writing the main story for the RJ and covering the aftermath as Nevada legislators were pushed to adopt tough new fire safety standards. Dahlberg would also ride with then-Sen. Paul Laxalt in his RV on the campaign trail that year as Laxalt headed toward his re-election while chairing the campaign of Ronald Reagan for president.
After joining the Las Vegas bureau of the Associated Press, Dahlberg covered the biggest stories of the time, including the trials of the Spilotro brothers, Wayne Newton’s libel suit against NBC, and a Culinary Union strike that paralyzed the Strip. He was on the scene of the Pepcon explosion, and there for the opening of the Mirage hotel.
Dahlberg soon gravitated to sports, helping the AP cover Muhammad Ali’s fight with Larry Holmes at Caesars Palace and launching a career covering the biggest sporting events in the world. He has covered 14 Olympics, more than 100 major golf championships, hundreds of championship fights, 10 Super Bowls and six World Series.
Dahlberg became one of only two national sports columnists for the AP in 2001, writing about a variety of sports for the world’s largest news organization. His voice was recognized in numerous APSE awards and in 2005 he was given the Sigma Delta Chi award for column writing by the Society of Professional Journalists.
Dahlberg’s career came full circle when he teamed up with former RJ publisher Sherman Frederick to form Battle Born Media in 2011. The company now owns six weekly newspapers in Nevada — including the Sparks Tribune, where Dahlberg got his start.
— From the nomination
Don Ham
During a 43-year career in journalism, Don Ham led the Nevada Appeal in Carson City as editor for more than a decade before shaping coverage on the Las Vegas Review-Journal’s city desk for the next 20 years.
A native of Southern California, he was formerly editor of the Lompoc Record, Bonita Publication weeklies in Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties, a copy and wire editor at the Inland Vally Daily Bulletin and a reporter in Fairfield, Calif.
“Although Don is as calm and steady an editor as you’ll ever meet, he’s a newsroom warrior,” wrote Glenn Cook. “He’s aggressive and competitive in gathering the news. But Don treats staff with courtesy and respect, while demanding accuracy, thoroughness and easy-to-understand writing.”
Retired now for two years, Ham had a hand in planning, assigning and shaping nearly every major story in the Review-Journal over two decades, even though most readers wouldn’t recognize his name.
“Little do they know that Don’s fingerprints are all over every crime, school, courts, government, transportation and politics story they read,” according to Cook.
His attention to detail also made him the newspaper’s style guru, helping compile and produce its local style guide and enabling the Review-Journal to be the first in the U.S. to publish its guide online.
A 1973 graduate of California State Polytechnic University in Pomona, Ham was appointed editor of the Appeal in 1984. He wrote and edited stories, laid out pages, planned promotions and special sections, oversaw the paper’s conversion to color and wrote most of its editorials.
He won several Nevada Press Association awards and was active in the Society of Professional Journalists. Ham joins a distinguished list of Nevada editors who toiled day and night behind the scenes to bring breaking news and in-depth coverage of the Legislature, courts, education and other institutions to readers with context and knowledge that few could match.
— From the nomination
