Kevin Gemmell
The first news story Kevin Gemmell wrote for a San Diego weekly is displayed on the ceiling of local bar, The Hut, directly above the line of scotch bottles, surrounded by dollar bills and business cards of fellow graduates.
"I consider myself really lucky because I’m one of those rare people who has known his whole life what I wanted to do," said Gemmell, whose parents still have pictures of him at Halloween at age four with a press badge on.
"I like being the guy that gets to tell people what’s going on," said the San Jose native and former Hut bartender, who proposed to his wife through the newspaper.
After starting out freelancing for $15 a story, Gemmell, 1999, now works as a staff writer in the sports department at The San Diego Union-Tribune, where he had the opportunity to cover the Rose Bowl game between USC and Texas in 2005.
"You have to be extremely patient because it’s a difficult field to break into," said Gemmell, who worked at weekly papers for five years before he got his break.
As a writer for The Santa Clara and sports editor of The Redwood for a year, Gemmell covered Santa Clara sports such as lacrosse, water polo, basketball and soccer, as well as played rugby for SCUTS.
"That’s what I’ve always wanted to do: be a sports writer," said Gemmell. "I’ve got the coolest job in the world. I get to go to sporting events and then tell people about it."
Gemmell freelances on the side for The Dallas Morning News, Palm Beach Post, and The Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
In his free time Gemmell plays poker with his buddies from Santa Clara, hangs out with his wife and plays with their dog, Jesse.
–Lindsey Hart, ’06
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