The Vindicator welcomes back Russell Payne

Russell Payne has joined The Vindicator as the new sales representative. A fourth-generation Dayton resident, he is a proud former Dayton Bronco and grandson of famed Dayton Broncho Barney Clifton Payne, who led Dayton to the 1941 Regional Championship. He is also the son of two former longtime Dayton educators, Barney Ray and Gloria Payne.

He attended Lee College and the University of Houston along the way, where he was winner of the Texas State Historical Association’s C.M. Caldwell Memorial Award for Excellence in Historical Research, Undergraduate Division, as well as 2002-03 Lee College Student of the Year.

Payne has spent the last 5 years working in radio and the local Texas Music Scene. Prior to that he had been in the newspaper business, and actually began his career at The Vindicator for the late and longtime Publisher Ernie Zieschang. He has worked in a number of positions from sales to editorial along the way with stops at the Diboll Free Press, Kaufman Herald, El Campo Leader-News and a number of other area publications.