More tributes to New York Times writer David Carr: “He grabbed a shovel”

I mentioned the death of New York Times media writer David Carr in this space last week, but I wanted to go back to Carr because the tributes and remembrances kept coming in, and I think they’re worth reading for anyone who cares about journalism and media.

Poynter.org writer Kristen Hare did a great job of collecting the best of them. Many come from people who were co-workers, friends, employees and students of Carr’s, and some come from people who barely knew him or only knew him through his work.

I keep running across snippets of tribute to Carr that become my new favorite until I run into the next one. My current favorite is this, mentioned in the Poynter piece, written by David Von Drehle in Time:

It’s no small thing to claw a path upward from that low point to a star-turn as the face of the New York Times—which was Carr’s role in the acclaimed documentary, “Page One.” The hidden ingredient was stupendous effort. The man did his homework. If a trench needed digging, he grabbed a shovel. In his early years at the Times, David wrote for every page, every section, uncomplainingly. He became the paper’s biggest cheerleader and one of its most original voices. The bosses wanted a blog—he blogged the Oscars. The bosses wanted video—he shambled in front of a hand-held camera. The bosses wanted live events—he slipped on a necktie and made himself an emcee.

That’s a formula anyone in any profession can put to good use, don’t you think? Where’s the next place a ditch needs digging? And more importantly, where’s the nearest shovel?