ABOUT JAMIE
For as long as Jamie Denty, a Texas native, can remember, her parents subscribed to The Dallas Morning News. Reading the newspaper was part of everyone’s daily routine. In 2011, when The Georgia Press Association inducted her into The Golden Club, the organization recognized the beginning of her journalism career in 1950, the year that she served as editor of her junior high newspaper, The Greiner Times. Thereafter, she frequently served as reporter for both high school and college clubs.
A graduate of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, with a degree in religion and a teaching certificate in English, Denty taught English at South Oak Cliff High School in Dallas for three years before she and her husband moved to his home state of Georgia. Making Jesup home, she began to say, “I was a small town girl all my life and just didn’t know it.”
While enrolled in a creative writing class in Brunswick, Georgia, The Coastal Illustrated published her first feature on bottle digging and collecting. Thereafter for two years, Denty wrote an article once a month for this publication. In 1971, a member of The Jesup Sentinel management team asked her to write a weekly column. She said, “I don’t know if I can write that often.” He responded, “If you don’t try, how will you ever know?” That response has prodded her to tackle new challenges throughout her career.
In 1973, Denty went to work for The Wayne County Press where she not only wrote a weekly column, but also a weekly feature and a weekly cooking article featuring a local cook. She learned much about the art of cooking from talking with some of Wayne County’s finest hometown cooks.
In 1976 when the two newspapers merged into The Press-Sentinel, Denty was named feature editor. In 1984, she became associate editor and oversaw the news department. During her career, she has won numerous state and national press awards for column, feature and news writing. She also submitted many of her features to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution which published every submission.
In 1986, Denty was recruited to take over the Wayne County High School journalism program and serve as adviser to its award-winning yearbook, The Jacket. In 1997, this publication was the first in Georgia inducted into the National Scholastic Press Association’s Yearbook Hall of Fame at the University of Minnesota. It earned this distinction after receiving 10 consecutive years of All American awards. Judges consistently praised the student writing. During her teaching career, she presented numerous writing workshops throughout Georgia and at Columbia University in New York. In 2002, she was named Georgia English Teacher of the Year. During these years, she continued to write a weekly column for The Press-Sentinel.
With retirement from teaching, she is once again writing features for The Press-Sentinel. For 47 years, she hasn’t missed writing a weekly column.
She and her husband of 59 years now live on the Georgia coast. She enjoys sitting on the back porch, watching the tide ebb and flood, observing the birds dine at the new feeder her husband has built, spying wood storks fly overhead or rest in nearby trees, viewing blue herons on the dock and often glimpsing otters at play. Every day, she sees a new subject for a column.
The Dentys have three children and seven grandchildren who have contributed photos from my back porch to this site. Grandson RED Denty designed the site.
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