Sybert retires after 43-year career at Butler Eagle
On the eve of retirement, Butler Eagle managing editor Donna Sybert said she lived her dream during a career that spanned more than 40 years at the daily newspaper.
Raised in Middlesex Township and still a resident of the Mars Area School District, Sybert started out as an intern in 1980 while she was studying journalism at Point Park College. She officially retired Friday, Jan. 16, but will continue working with the newsroom on several initiatives.
John Wise Jr., editor and an owner of the Eagle Printing Company, called and offered her a job when she graduated in 1982. She started work as a feature writer and photographer, not knowing then it would become her lifework.
“I got into journalism because I wanted to learn about everything. I love a good news story. They’re like wonderful puzzles you have to follow,” Sybert said.
After just two years on the job, she became the editor of Focus, then the Eagle’s lifestyle section.
She was promoted in 1989 to chief of the Eagle’s first copy desk, a group of editors who edit stories and lay out the pages of the newspaper before printing. Before the copy desk was created, all stories went through the city editor and wire editor with special department editors, such as Focus or sports handling their own stories.
The process of designing and laying out pages became electronic when the Eagle’s first pagination software system went into use shortly after the copy desk was created.
Her climb reached another rung in 1995 when she was named news editor by managing editor Mark Mann and placed in charge of all printed products, including special sections.
“During these years, I redesigned the Butler Eagle three times,” Sybert said.
Her next promotion came in 2017 when she became the associate managing editor charged with overseeing special sections, in-depth reporting projects, social media usage and operational duties like scheduling.
Three years later in 2020, she was named managing editor, in charge of all editorial aspects of Eagle publications.
Sybert said she loved working with reporters and editors, and serving the community where she lives through the newsroom’s reporting.
“I worked with some amazing journalists, was able to learn from incredible role models and have been inspired by the young writers and editors joining our industry,” Sybert said. “You have to love it. It’s a passion, not a job.”
During her internship, she met her future husband, Steve Sybert, who was working as a sports reporter. He went on to become a copy editor at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and retired in 2020. They have two adult children, both graduates of Mars Area High School.
“I got to live my dream and raise my family,” Sybert said. “We do important journalism here — important stories that make a difference.”
Living in the community where she works has made her a point of contact outside the newsroom. She said parents she saw at her children’s school activities, and people she encountered while shopping have never hesitated to tell her what they want to see in the Eagle.
“Readers are invested in the Butler Eagle and are not shy about telling you what they like and what they’d like to see changed,” Sybert said.
Working for a small-town newspaper, Sybert said the editors are accessible to readers and she regularly received phone calls from them.
She said she has been involved in and led discussions about reporting on major news events over the years, such as the attempted assassination of Donald Trump during his 2024 presidential campaign stop and the county’s struggle during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sybert recalled the energy behind the newsroom’s efforts in 2017, reporting on the discovery of the remains of the man who fatally shot Saxonburg Police Chief Gregory Adams in 1980 and the incredible story of how the fugitive was hidden for decades by his wife.
She was in the newsroom when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded in 1986 and as editors struggled with how this family newspaper would cover the suicide of former state Treasurer R. Budd Dwyer during a live news conference in 1987.
The Eagle has to be “light on its feet” to plan and write stories about fast developing news.
“We must make decisions quickly to get the paper out,” Sybert said.
She takes particular pride in helping create the Soar student newspaper, which the Eagle publishes in collaboration with area school districts and private schools, and the Eagle’s America250 special editions, a project supported by the America 250PA -Butler County committee and the county commissioners.
“Soar started out of COVID to let people see what’s going on in school,” Sybert said. “To share students’ hopes, their artwork, their poetry. To bring us all some joy.”
The COVID-19 pandemic created challenges for the Eagle, but as a journalist, Sybert was considered essential and kept the letter from the state giving her permission to travel during the shutdown in the glove box of her car.
She said America 250 stories about the history of the county, state and nation needed to be planned out to span the three-and-half-year project.
“I love history so working on ‘America 250: A Journey Through Time,’ was a joy,” Sybert said.
Eagle publisher Tammy Schuey credits Sybert with helping launch Soar, America250 and a student journalism program.
“She can take an idea and make it happen. She can map it out and make it amazing for our readers,” Schuey said.
Schuey and Sybert met every day to plan reporting and coverage of daily and upcoming events.
“I’ll miss our daily conversations about news and making sure we’re putting out the best product we can,” Schuey said. “She’s been a fixture in our newsroom in a leadership role since I’ve been here. She’s passionate about the integrity of the Butler Eagle.”
Former managing editor Mark Mann said he depended on Sybert who was the news editor during his 25 years in the position through his retirement in 2016.
A veteran in the newspaper industry, Mann placed Sybert among the best journalists he worked with.
“I worked for five other newspapers. She was as good a journalist as I worked with. She was one of the best and would fit in at any paper where I worked,” Mann said.
He said she made sure stories were submitted, edited and laid out in a timely fashion to get the paper out on deadline. When the Eagle started a Sunday edition, he said he and Sybert worked many evenings preparing the publication, and she never complained about it.
“She was very dependable. If I asked her to do something, it got done, and it was done on time. She is dependable, professional and had a positive attitude about everything,” Mann said.
He also credited Sybert with leading the newsroom through at least two computer upgrades.
“She was extremely capable. She was an asset to the paper and the community. She helped make the paper what it was and what is has become,” Mann said.
