Wine reporter, desk editor Gevirtz leaving Reuters

Leslie Gevirtz, a desk editor for Reuters in New York who also wrote about the wine industry, is leaving the news agency.

Here is her farewell message:

Forgive the wide distribution, but I’ve been lucky enough to have worked in all three Reuters “hemispheres”. One of the first editors I had explained to me that if you couldn’t tell a story in 300 words or less, you didn’t know what the story was. So this will be relatively short and bitter sweet.

Today is my last day at Reuters. It has indeed been a privilege to work for 24 years among some of the best and brightest journalists in the world. And, it’s also been a great deal of fun. Whether imitating Eva Gabor in Green Acres by stomping through Vermont’s maple syrup sugaries in a full-length, black, cashmere coat, or, chasing after McCain and the six other dwarfs running for the 2000 Republican presidential nod, it’s been, as Bette O’Connor used to say, “good crack”. There were air disasters – Egypt Air, TWA 800 and, of course, John F. Kennedy Jr. There were weather disasters – the ’98 ice storm that crippled Ontario, Quebec, New York and New England; and blizzards and hurricanes too numerous to remember. And I had a great team working with me – Tim McLaughlin, Mike Ellis, Tony Munroe, Matt Lewis and the late Alan Dowd.

I want to thank the women at Reuters and especially Belinda Goldsmith for saying, “So Leslie, would you care to write about wine?” and opened a new world for me. I can’t name all of you who have been so helpful, but Patti Domm and Evelyn Leopold, Janet Guttsman, Mary Milliken, Maggie Fox, Pat Reaney, Sarah Edmonds and Betty Wong, and of course, Toni Reinhold, all provided guidance. Thanks, too, to Sue Thomas, Jane Baird and Erica Billingham for taking a Yank under their wing.

To those of you who remain, I want to say that news – accurate, quickly delivered, and without bias – will always have a market.