The time has come to say goodbye after nearly 45 years being employed by The Sentinel. Today I’m retiring.
I decided to do this about six months ago. Having lost my dad and two of my brother-in-laws at the age of 64, and having gone through two surgeries last year, I decided to call it quits at 65 and take life a little easier for however many years I have left. It wasn’t a hard decision. Although I’d never entertained the thought of retirement until this year, somehow I knew the time was right.
Last year was a tremendously difficult year for me. The changes in this industry are moving at light-speed and quite frankly, I’m finding myself having trouble keeping up with them. The Internet has revolutionized not only the way we do business, but the way we literally think about information dissemination. Does this mean The Sentinel is doomed? I don’t think so. We survived the invention called radio, and we survived television when it broke onto the scene. We will survive the Internet as well. It just changes the way we do business in a big way.
When I started here back in April of 1965 we were printing the newspaper on a flat-bed press and it took about two and one-half hours to print. All the type was set up in hot lead and the shop area was a sweatbox. I remember guys coming to work in T-shirts and jeans and going home drenched in sweat. There was no air conditioning and it wouldn’t have done any good anyway with all the firepots melting lead all day.
Several presses later we moved into the offset printing world where hot lead was obsolete and everything was done through computers and photography. We could now print the entire paper in as little as 20 minutes. We did a little remodeling and put in air conditioning resulting in a much better working environment. Ken Krehbiel was the owner of the paper back in those days and I was nothing but a young whipper-snapper selling ads. I’ve often thought that he’d roll over in his grave if he knew I was running this newspaper!
The Sentinel has been a tremendously successful newspaper and remains today as one of the leading GateHouse Media newspapers in Kansas. Not because of what I did, but because of the exceptional people around me. I’m proud of my staff for that accomplishment. I’m not going to miss taking work home on the weekends, I’m not going to miss having to fill out all the reports that corporate demands, but I will miss the people here. They have literally given me their lives, especially these past few years while we’ve been dealing with unparalleled Internet development and a recession to boot. To each of them, I humbly say, “Thanks so much for a job well done.”
As I turn in my keys and walk out the door tonight, I feel I can leave without too many regrets. I also feel very confident that I can leave knowing this newspaper is in the hands of some of some of the best people I know who will insure its position as the leading source for news in McPherson for many years to come.
It’s been a good ride.
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The time has come to say goodbye after nearly 45 years being employed by The Sentinel. Today I’m retiring.
I decided to do this about six months ago. Having lost my dad and two of my brother-in-laws at the age of 64, and having gone through two surgeries last year, I decided to call it quits at 65 and take life a little easier for however many years I have left. It wasn’t a hard decision. Although I’d never entertained the thought of retirement until this year, somehow I knew the time was right.
Last year was a tremendously difficult year for me. The changes in this industry are moving at light-speed and quite frankly, I’m finding myself having trouble keeping up with them. The Internet has revolutionized not only the way we do business, but the way we literally think about information dissemination. Does this mean The Sentinel is doomed? I don’t think so. We survived the invention called radio, and we survived television when it broke onto the scene. We will survive the Internet as well. It just changes the way we do business in a big way.
When I started here back in April of 1965 we were printing the newspaper on a flat-bed press and it took about two and one-half hours to print. All the type was set up in hot lead and the shop area was a sweatbox. I remember guys coming to work in T-shirts and jeans and going home drenched in sweat. There was no air conditioning and it wouldn’t have done any good anyway with all the firepots melting lead all day.
Several presses later we moved into the offset printing world where hot lead was obsolete and everything was done through computers and photography. We could now print the entire paper in as little as 20 minutes. We did a little remodeling and put in air conditioning resulting in a much better working environment. Ken Krehbiel was the owner of the paper back in those days and I was nothing but a young whipper-snapper selling ads. I’ve often thought that he’d roll over in his grave if he knew I was running this newspaper!
The Sentinel has been a tremendously successful newspaper and remains today as one of the leading GateHouse Media newspapers in Kansas. Not because of what I did, but because of the exceptional people around me. I’m proud of my staff for that accomplishment. I’m not going to miss taking work home on the weekends, I’m not going to miss having to fill out all the reports that corporate demands, but I will miss the people here. They have literally given me their lives, especially these past few years while we’ve been dealing with unparalleled Internet development and a recession to boot. To each of them, I humbly say, “Thanks so much for a job well done.”
As I turn in my keys and walk out the door tonight, I feel I can leave without too many regrets. I also feel very confident that I can leave knowing this newspaper is in the hands of some of some of the best people I know who will insure its position as the leading source for news in McPherson for many years to come.
It’s been a good ride.
