It’s no secret that The Washington Times has long been gawked at and whispered about, due in part to the conservative slant of a popular paper within an awfully liberal town, partly to its ownership by a religious zealot like Rev. Sun Myung Moon, and partly to the management styles of editor-in-chief Wesley Pruden and managing editor Frances Coombs.

Rumors of sexism, racism and general ill-will within the walls of the Times are pretty much commonplace. Most current and former employees, though, don’t go on the record to add weight to the gossip. After all, many want to keep working in this town, and some don’t want to face the wrath that would likely ensue from their bosses.

Slowly and surely, however, voices are coming out of the woodwork.

“Francis B. Coombs, Jr. is one of the most ill-tempered managers I have ever known, but as an editor he supported and strengthened my stories over many years,” George Archibald, an esteemed former reporter of the Times told Big Head DC after seeing our item last week about an impending shakeup in the management of the paper. “Fran yells and screams at reporters and editors in his office whenever they don’t do his bidding, or Wes Pruden’s (who also has a foul temper), uses the F-word, the Goddammit-word, stands up at his desk with a hateful look on his face, jabs his finger at you, says he will fire you on the spot if you don’t do what he wants.”

Marlene Johnson, currently an editor at The Washington Continent and the former Times arts editor (and an African American), noted recently that Coombs often overlooks racist behavior in the newsroom. Johnson told the The Nation last fall that she was once given an order from Pruden, delivered to her by Coombs, to stop doing “so many black stories.”

Archibald, for one, believes the “ill-tempered management style” of Coombs to be the main reason that many talented journalists have left The Washington Times over the years. “[H]e has caused the exodus of talent,” Archibald said. People just won’t put up with this work environment after awhile, even though they need paycvhecks for the mortgage….”

Today, with new rumors spreading about the impending retirement of Pruden, age 70, many are wondering who will replace him — and most people we’ve spoken to who currently work for or who have worked at the publication in the past desperately don’t want it to be Coombs.

We’ll have more on the development soon.