New York-based photographer Ann Hermes has spent recent months capturing the dwindling presence of local newsrooms across the United States, focusing on the people and environments facing decline amid the broader challenges confronting the journalism industry. Her work, which includes visits to roughly 50 news organizations primarily in smaller towns and cities, highlights the often overlooked realities of local reporters and their workplaces.

One such image depicts Tom Haley, a journalist at the Rutland Herald in Vermont, seated amid cluttered desks filled with notebooks, newspapers, printed reports, and personal items. The newsroom’s worn surroundings and casual dress reflect the modest, sometimes chaotic conditions many local journalists endure daily, a far cry from the glamorous perceptions often associated with the profession.

Hermes’ interest lies in spaces and traditions that signal transition or disappearance, as demonstrated in her previous projects featuring the last operational Morse code station in North America and vintage department store photo booths. Her current focus on newsrooms aims to document environments threatened by the prolonged decline in local journalism, which has seen numerous outlets shutter or drastically scale back operations. One outlet she photographed, located in Alameda, California, has since closed.

The photographer emphasizes that her work is meant as a tribute rather than a critique, capturing the dedication of the “true believers” in local journalism who continue their work despite shrinking resources, community resistance, and the diminishing rewards of the profession. Hermes notes the vital civic service these journalists provide, often in the face of public and political pressure.

Her images reveal offices cluttered with everyday objects—a bottle of whiskey near notebooks, antacid pills atop a microwave, a metal organizer labeled “stories to be written” left empty—signifying both the personal and institutional histories held within these communities. Hermes underscores the loss that occurs when these newsrooms disappear, along with the records and memories they safeguard.

The photographer’s collection is available on her website, and she intends to publish a book compiling these newsroom portraits, preserving a visual record of an industry grappling with profound change.