© National Geographic
In the opening days of the month when
National Geographic magazine is
scheduled to be turned over to 21st Century Fox, the magazine's employees were told to stand by their phones to wait for calls - one by one - to come to Human Resources to learn the fate of their jobs.
A memo sent to all staff on Monday from CEO Gary Knell told the magazine's employees to return to Washington to Geographic's headquarters if possible to wait for an eMail on Tuesday which would give them more information about their employment status.
"No one knows how many will be axed today," a source inside
National Geographic told
News Photographer magazine this morning. "The staff is sitting by their phones, waiting to be called down to HR."
In a Tweet mid-day today,
National Geographic photo editor Sherry L. Brukbacher confirmed that she is one of the staff members who've been let go.
"Experienced
National Geographic Photo Editor looking for employment. Fox merger elim [sic] many today. Will miss my amazing colleagues!" -
@SBrukbacher. She also Tweeted that she won't be talking to reporters. "Too much respect for my many wonderful colleagues," she wrote.
National Geographic picture editor Kim Hubbard was one of those impacted by today's layoffs. She told her friends in a posting on Facebook, "Thank you for the calls and messages on what has been a surreal and sad day. Over the past five years I've worked with some amazing photographers, designers, writers, editors, and scientists on stories that I am incredibly proud of. Now I'm looking ahead to the next big thing (if you know what that is, please let me know! I'll be with
Nat Geo until Jan 31st."
An eMail sent out this morning from Nancy Lee Ott, one of
National Geographic Creative's picture editors, to the magazine's photographers confirmed that she was one of the staff let go. Ott's eMail today told the NGS photographers, "You have been the light of my life these last 28 years." She started in the magazine's photography lab with 35mm film and up until today's layoffs she worked in the magazine's image catalog collection.
Veteran
National Geographic photographer Michael "Nick" Nichols also left the magazine today. Nichols
told The Guardian, "I was getting ready to retire in January. So for me this is kind of a gift. But it's a sad day for my friends who were not as ready." He started at the
Geographic in 1996.
Among those who were the first to be let go on Tuesday morning, according to our source, was also one of the magazine's top picture editors and one of the magazine's page designers who - according to several photographers - was "the best designer" on staff.
Comment: Perhaps the this will help us to form a final analysis of the disaster: