Week of 3.29.2009
Cut this editor and he bleeds ink!
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written by Bill:
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The Spectator
A place for intelligent writers
A place for intelligent readers
founded 2004 by ron cruger
Bill Barth
The fellow who runs this operation — Ron Cruger, the Spectator himself — apparently thinks I can write.
You, intrepid readers,
will cast the deciding vote on that question.
Ron and I go back a long way, some 30 years, to be as exact as my mathematically-challenged
brain can manage. He was in newspaper management at the time. His company dispatched him to the chilly gray skies over the industrial
river town of Beloit, Wisconsin, where he was to run the paper I worked for as a young journalist with more energy and ambition than
good sense.
Along the way we forged a productive relationship — at least it seemed productive to me — and eventually Ron promoted
me to the managing editor’s role in the newsroom. I had no idea what I was doing. So I settled on the logical strategy — I faked it.
Apparently,
I faked it fairly well because I’ve managed to stay employed all these years in the same newsroom. The title now is “editor” and the
role has expanded, somewhat, but I’m still doing what I love — telling stories and trying to make a difference, here and there, in
the lives of people and the evolution of a community.
That’s a tentative first step toward introducing myself to the readers of
this online journal, which seems like a sensible thing to do in response to Ron’s invitation to contribute. I always like to know
a little something about the folks who create the words I read. In case you share the sentiment, here are the salient points:
•
I’m a Midwesterner, through and through, raised on a downstate Illinois farm. Yes, I had a horse. Yes, he and I chased cattle until
we were both too tired to continue. Yes, the farm is still in the family and I visit whenever I can. It’s far from any city. The sky
there is so black that all the stars rendered invisible by civilization’s omnipresent dome of light burn with breathtaking brilliance
on cloudless nights.
• My mom blames Clark Kent for me leaving the peaceful harmony of rural life on the farm. Really, though, it’s
her fault. After all, she’s the one who made the blue suit and red cape for a five-year-old.
• I love America and I’ve seen an awful
lot of it. I don’t yearn to see Paris or Tokyo, but I can’t get enough of this amazing land we are privileged to call home. I’ve driven
the full length of the Alaska-Canada Highway; walked Boston’s Freedom Trail; gazed out at the Mississippi from the Arch; wept at the
Alamo; felt small and insignificant along the Rockies’ Trail Ridge Road; marveled at the natural majesty of the Pacific Coast Highway;
walked the rocky shores of Maine; explored ancient cliff dwellings in Arizona; strolled from monument to monument in Washington, and
even had lunch in the Reagan White House. My soul craves deep roots and traditional American values. I found both along the Illinois-Wisconsin
border, close enough to Chicago to embrace that city’s world-class culture (and get my Bears fix at Soldier Field), far enough away
for a farm boy to avoid the crush and noise of the urban wilderness.
• I’m a true believer in the indispensability of newspapers.
Cut me and I bleed ink. I love the way it smells. The moist feel of the paper, fresh off the press, excites my spirit. The thunk-thunk-thunk
of the cylinders turning as the paper winds through the machinery is sweet music to my ears. I have a speech I give the young journalists
in my charge. I must have repeated it a thousand times. Part of it goes like this: “Do you know how lucky you are? Do you realize
you have what millions and millions of people, all over this planet, would die to have? You have a voice! You get to make a difference.
Every day, you need to ask yourself, what am I going to do with this gift?”
A little hokey? Maybe. So what? We need more true believers
these days. Too many people plod along, shifting with the prevailing winds, unsure who they are and what they stand for. What a waste.
As
for me, I intend to use my voice, which is why I appreciate Ron’s invitation. I’ll be a newspaperman until (1) I’m dead; (2) my bosses
boot me out; or (3) the last thunk-thunk-thunk fades from the final pressroom. But writing is writing, and this will be fun, too.
I
hope you’ll join me, now and then. Even better, I hope you will be moved to send in your own comments and thoughts. The American experiment
is not a spectator sport, you know, despite the name of this website.