I came across an old photo while we were cleaning out files to prepare to move the newspaper office. The sepia-toned print is of a nice looking young man in an Army dress uniform. His tie is tucked into the shirt, cap on his head, and a slight smile on his face. Someone had written below on the cardboard frame, “Staff Sgt. Lee H.C.
An inscription, likely from Lee is on the flap of the frame, which seemed to have served as a protective envelope for mailing. It is torn now, but the barely legible inscription reads: To Momma and Auntie.
The photo was accompanied by a typewritten piece of blue...
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My dad is the primary reason I have been a Willie Nelson fan for more than 40 years, harkening back to when I mainly listened to rock ‘n’ roll and did not think country was cool. Country was Porter Waggoner in a silly suit and pompadour, Ernest Tubb and the Texas Troubadours, and Eddie Arnold. My dad listened to Eddie Arnold incessantly, indeed obsessively. Eddie was probably a delightful gentleman, but to a long-haired teenager’s ears it was like listening to elevator music combined with fingernails scratching down a chalkboard. I thought if I heard “Make the World Go Away” one more...
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I was searching online for a way to apply for a gas card for the newspaper and ended up in search my newspaper email account by clicking on the wrong box on the screen. An email, hitherto unnoticed by me, titled in all caps (always a bad sign) YOUR OPPORTUNITY FROM EXXONMOBIL LONDON, appeared. It seems Mr. Peter Alexandra needs my assistance. He “overinvoiced” a contract a few years ago.
“I need your full cooperation and partnership to re-profile this contract funds amounting to $2.5M to your name as the contractor that executed this contract in Asia few years.”
That is exactly how it read;...
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We are moving the newspaper office next Saturday, on the day coincidentally that I mark my 59th birthday. Thus I will mark the beginning of my final year in my 50s by sweating heavily, trying not to strain my back, and doing what I can to assist men much stronger and younger than me to move desks, filing cabinets, and all the other furnishings — in time for us to open in our new location the following Monday morning.
I have worked for 12 newspapers and published 10 of them, and this is only the second time I have helped move a newspaper office. The first time was 36 years ago, when I had more...
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An unhappy customer called me the other day. He had every reason to be displeased, because we had given him poor service. His approach was to use foul language, which I endured. I figured he would eventually settle down and then maybe we could reason together.
I don’t like getting cussed out any more than the next person, but sometimes that just goes with the territory. In my younger years, I might have bowed up and told the fellow to quit using words we don’t print in a family newspaper. But with age occasionally comes wisdom, so I generally let angry customers blow off steam. Eventually,...
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I walk three-and-a-half miles every morning unless it is pouring down rain, accompanied by Sam, our dimwitted but lovable poodle mix. The alarm goes off at 5:30. I jump up and get out the door in 15 minutes, a half-cup of coffee and a large swig of Diet Coke in my gullet to jumpstart my brain. I know that sounds gross, but it works for me.
My habit is to listen to National Public Radio on my iPhone while I walk to get a headstart on the news. I am a loyal listener to Red River Radio, based in Shreveport but with repeater stations throughout the area, since I do weekly commentaries for them every...
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David Weston walked up as I wandered unaccompanied through the Franklin County Courthouse in Mt. Vernon last week, taking photographs of the final stages of the restoration of the 1912 building. Once I explained why I was taking photos, for a story in the paper, he enthusiastically conducted a top-to-bottom tour of this grand old building. Weston, 57, is the superintendent on the project, a man clearly in love with his work.
“People ask when I’m going to retire. When I die, that’s when,” he said. Weston is from Long Island, N.Y. and sports two gold earrings in each lobe and a scraggly...
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There’s only two things that money can’t buy, and that’s true love and home-grown tomatoes.
Guy Clark
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OK, technically you can buy homegrown tomatoes this time of year from vegetable stands alongside the highway. But unless one is utterly friendless or a hermit, right about now tomato-growing friends, acquaintances and kinfolk begin bombarding everybody they know with tomatoes. That is one of the few redeeming features of an East Texas summer, in my humble estimation. The weather usually is ridiculously humid and hot, and it generally stays that way until late September. But at least...
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I walk among the ghosts of newspapers past in the building we occupy at present. A newspaper office once required armies of people to produce the Daily Miracle — as it is often called by folks in the business because some days that is how getting out a paper feels — a minor miracle. Now, because of technology, physically producing a paper requires fewer people and even fewer tools. It still requires access to a printing press, of course, and other large pieces of equipment, but the front end of newspapering is largely done staring at computer screens.
When I started at the Longview Daily...
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Today is the Fourth of July, of course, when Americans celebrate their independence by barbecuing, drinking copious amounts of libations and getting sunburned. I spent much of the morning helping orchestrate the annual Daily Tribune Turtle Race, in which about 55 youngsters competed for cash prizes, certificates and bragging rights. Everybody got a T-shirt, and the weather out at Dellwood Park was perfect.
Roughly 150 folks in all were on hand to cheer on the turtles. The race, created by my predecessor, involves running several heats with a half-dozen turtles in each heat. The kids place the turtles,...
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