Q&A
BACKDROP’S
BEGINNINGS Fifteen years after its start, Backdrop’s creator and first editor-in-chief sits down to talk about some origins of her own.
BY ELEANOR BISHOP | ILLUSTRATION BY MACEY ELDER
A
shley Luther Micklish, Backdrop’s first editor-inchief, had no idea that what started as a class project would grow into Ohio University’s first and now oldest student-run magazine. Since graduating from OU in 2008, Micklish has ventured into successful careers in brand strategy and marketing, working for companies like Toms, Nike and currently, the coupon aggregator Honey.
How did Backdrop come to be?
I was a magazine journalism major within Scripps and my junior year, which would have been '06-'07, we [took] that one class … it was basically a capstone magazine class, and [former editor-in-chief of Writer’s Digest and Boston Magazine, John Joseph “Jack”] Brady was our professor. He was a mentor, and I was really inspired by him and his experience. Part of our end–of–the year project was creating a concept for a publication, creating a business plan, coming up with the editorial calendar, coming up with the sections, all that stuff, but all just for presentation. We came up with Backdrop as an idea then in that class. A couple of us got beers after the class and we were all like, “Well, why don’t we just do this on our own?” [So] we thought, “OK, let’s bust this out into the world for real. And if it fails who cares, we’re just trying.” Never did we really expect it to still be going on for so long.
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backdrop | Spring 2021
