Celebrating its 50th anniversary and reminiscing about my early years at The Chronicle

By Judie Holcomb-Pack As I started to write about my first “tour” at The Chronicle  in the mid-1990s in celebration of its 50th anniversary, it seemed like it was only a couple years ago that I sat in a cubicle in the Liberty Street building and talked with advertisers about deadlines and ad rates as a sales person and special sections coordinator. As one of the two or three white people on staff, I was concerned with how I would fit in, but I found I was quickly accepted and became friends with my coworkers. I did experience discrimination, but it was from white people, which always caught me off guard. Once I was in an appliance section of a major department store, along with our photographer, to take photos for a story I was working on about what was new in appliances that year. I had received approval to take photos from the store manager since his store would be mentioned in the article. I was met by a salesperson and as he showed me around his department, he made a comment about me being with the Journal and I corrected him, saying no, I was with The Chronicle....