Newsquest’s Yorkshire Weeklies editor Jon Stokoe is celebrating his final day with the publisher with one last issue of the Ryedale Gazette & Herald.
If his Twitter post to mark the occasion – featuring an apparently relaxed image of an empty laptop homescreen – is anything to go by we can perhaps surmise it’s been a fairly uneventful week in Ryedale. The picture appears to have been taken at 6.58am though, so it’s probably fair to assume that was the calm before the storm, and things have doubtless livened up since as Stokoe brings his 20-month stint at Newsquest to a close.
Last working day with Newsquest today.
And I’m going out in style with a final @gazetteherald deadline day.
Let’s do this. pic.twitter.com/TVgjrhyx6K
— Jon Stokoe (@jonstokoe) April 11, 2023
Stokoe handed in his notice in the Yorkshire Weeklies editor role at the end of February with no new job lined up, later describing the decision on LinkedIn as “the toughest decision of my life.”
Seemingly all’s well that ends well, however, as last month Stokoe announced he would be taking up the post of communications manager for Clarity Business Travel.
The veteran journalist may well be sorely missed by readers in the region as he steps over into the comms realm – he’s been a mainstay of the Yorkshire and Lincolnshire news media ever since he started out as a trainee at the Whitby Gazette back in 1995. He eventually rose to editor of the title, via spells at the Scarborough Eveneing News and National Club Golfer, in 2009.
Following redundancy at the Gazette due to cost-cutting measures in 2013, Stokoe served spells at the Lincolnshire Echo and The Dalesman before landing the Newsquest weeklies gig in September 2021.
The Yorkshire Weeklies’ stable also includes the Craven Herald and Pioneer, Ilkley Gazette, Keighley News and Wharfedale Observer
