Lou Ann Frala
HEADLINE WRITING
Palm Beach Post

The masterful wordsmith who is the Palm Beach Post op-ed editor began her career in, of all places, the sports department of the Kansas City Star.

"It was an accident," Lou Ann Frala recalled.

"When they divvied us up in college for my first reporting class, they gave us three choices � news, features or sports. We had to rank them in the order we would take them. "I ranked them just that way, but when they posted who went where, I was in sports. It was either take it, or change to the class the next semester. I took it.

"I covered junior high basketball, women's swimming and diving and men's golf. I thought, rightly as it turned out, that if I could survive that, I could survive just about anything."

Do good headline writers have plays on words come to them quickly at first, and after applying a "too corny" test, do the writers move on?

"Even corn can work if it's garnished properly," Frala replied. "We try to avoid the easy puns. The op-ed page is no place for 'groaners.' "

Doesn't an op-ed editor who is overtly presenting a letter writer or columnist's viewpoint have a clearer path to a more direct headline than she might on the news side?

"There can be a little more latitude," Frala said. "A strong opinion, well-stated is our goal in letters, editorials and columns, so we hope the headlines reflect that." The Kansas City, Mo., native graduated from the University of Missouri-Columbia with a degree in journalism. After stints at papers in Missouri and Texas, she joined the Post in 1985.

Frala worked on the paper's universal copy desk and in Business and Sports before being named op-ed editor in 1998.