Special leads

Rush to finish barrier at Howard Hanson Dam before heavy rains
The Seattle Times - Oct. 5, 2009
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2010001508_dam05m.html

This story is an example of a narrative lead. The lead reads:

"In 1949, the Army Corps of Engineers warned that water might seep through the north abutment of a dam being contemplated on the Green River, but the leak 'would be negligible and could be easily controlled.'

It wasn't.

The abutment — a hillside that anchors one side of the Howard Hanson Dam — has leaked almost since the dam began operating in 1961. Engineers have monitored it, worried about it, debated what to do with it and made a series of improvements to control it.

The latest leak, detected after a huge rainstorm last January filled the reservoir higher than ever, prompted the corps to reclassify Hanson as "unsafe" with an "urgent and compelling" need for immediate action. Only 10 of the corps' 650-plus dams fall into that high-risk category."

The newsworthy information does not come until the fourth paragraph in the story. The first three paragraphs are used primarily to set up the background information of the dam and to explain the severity of the situation.

I think this lead is the best choice because it is not just a basic news story so a summary lead wouldn't be enough. Plus the actual event occurred the previous year so it is not very timely and wouldn't be considered hard news. I think this was the best way to go about writing this lead.

Charles R. Cross publishes new, interactive Led Zeppelin book
The Seattle Times - Oct. 5, 2009
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/books/2009991075_ledzep05.html

Another example of a narrative lead.

"On May 11, 1969, Led Zeppelin, then a relatively unknown but up-and-coming British rock band, played a concert in Seattle before a few thousand people at the Aqua Theater at Green Lake, drawing noise complaints from some of the area's residents.

Led Zeppelin, which would become one of rock music's seminal bands, shared the bill that day with Three Dog Night; this paper reported the concert to be a "smashing success." Seattle, said local rock historian and journalist Charles R. Cross, "has always had more of an appetite for hard rock than other cities," part of what he called that "blue-collar, longshoreman ethic."

In fact, Led Zeppelin proved to be a big influence for many local bands that became famous in the 1990s during the city's grunge-music era: Nirvana, Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam. It was "the template for what a hard rock band should be," Cross said.

Led Zeppelin is the subject of Cross' latest book, "Led Zeppelin: Shadows Taller Than Our Souls," due to be released Tuesday. The title is a relatively obscure line from perhaps the band's most famous song, "Stairway to Heaven," and a reference to the book's premise — that the band has had an outsize influence on rock music, one that could not be fully predicted or appreciated when the band was together. "

The story is about Cross' new book "Led Zeppelin: Shadows Taller Than Our Souls" but doesn't reference the book until the fourth paragraph. The first three graphs are used to explain Led Zeppelin's importance and, specifically, its importance in the Seattle area.

The book would be hard to write a hard, summary news lead about and none of the other special lead types would make sense in this situation. I think the current lead captured what the author wanted to get across better than any other way it could have been done.