Rewrite man

The rewrite man is a newspaper reporter who works in the office, not on the street, taking information reported by others and crafting it into stories. It is rarely used as an actual title. The term rewrite man is something of a misnomer. Some are women, of course, and rewrite men do not just rewrite. 

They take notes gathered by on-the-scene-reporters, information gathered by telephone, or from wire services or clippings from other newspapers, and write articles. Sometimes an entire front page, with bylines from several different reporters, will have actually been written by a single rewrite man working with an editor.

The job has lost much of its importance due to technology that allows reporters to write and transmit articles from the field. In the pre-computer days of newspaper work, however, it was vital. Rewrite men are common at large national magazines while a writer takes the material and writes the actual article.

People Magazine stories are written in this format, with field reporters doing the reporting and New York based writers writing the pieces. At the most extreme example, reporters on deadline would telephone into the newsroom and dictate their notes to an editor and shouting into the phone.