The decades have flown by in the newsroom
By Lethbridge Herald on August 13, 2022.
LEAVE IT TO BEEBER
Al Beeber
Lethbridge Herald
The time has come to disappear for a week and enjoy summer sunrises and evening sunsets. Oh wait, I enjoy every morning thanks to my daily walks in the park with Ben dog. There used to be three of us but Rio’s arthritic hips are so bad he’s happy to walk around the block a couple of times a week and he’s earned that privilege after 11 years of exploring and providing me with incredible canine company. But sunsets are another matter since I’m up pretty much every day around 4 a.m.
Needless to say, this will be my last column for two weeks as I take some time off to relax.
I’m not sure what’s in store over the next few days and I’m not going to plan anything because I desperately need to give myself some unstructured time which I’m terrible at doing.
My days are so hectic that I have to force myself to spend time just living life spontaneously.
If not for my fantasy baseball pool, I’d leave the phone in its charger all day but as I’ve written I need to check my team a few times a day to make sure I have a full lineup.
But aside from that duty, I’m staying away from the phone completely. We all need time to turn off the world once in awhile and this is my time.
On Wednesday, I’ll be marking my 35th anniversary here at The Herald and will probably spend some time reminiscing about my decades here.
I’ll also be doing a toast of some sort to the former owners of the Fort Frances Times, the Cumming family, who gave me my start back in 1980 after I made a decent impression in a telephone interview from my late dad’s house in the Calgary neighbourhood of Bridgeland.
Jim Cumming, the newspaper’s advertising manager and son of owners Bob and Del, must have thought I had potential and so in February of 1980, I’d landed my first job – as a sports writer in northwestern Ontario, a job I started just a few months later. I heard about the job from a classmate named Doneen Moran, whose brother Jon Fryer – a renowned transplant surgeon in Chicago – recently died from the effects of ALS. Jon was my age and I got to know him and brother Ron when they’d come home for the summer. And I played basketball with their dad, Bob, a junior high school principal, on winter Wednesday nights.
As I write this, I’m the longest serving member of the newsroom. Bruce Friesen is the sole remaining other staff member still working here when I started. Rod Peake in the press room, though, I think has been with the company longer than both of us.
When I first started here, John Fairington, who hired me, was the managing editor and Garry Allison was city editor. Ric Swihart was agriculture editor and Ron Watmough the business editor. Randy Jensen was editor of the sports department, which was a three-person team that also included Ron Devitt and Craig Albrecht, who now does communications along with Kristen Saturley at the Lethbridge Police Services. Kristen, who I tend to run into at Costco or Superstore, is another ex-Herald newsie.
I’m honoured that Craig and I are still pals after all these years, a friendship that’s withstood a lot of hockey games, including one where I was mistaken for him and got pummelled by a player who took umbrage with Craig’s fancy stick work when he and I were defence partners.
Trent Fujita, who is well-known in the city, was also briefly my defence partner for awhile and somehow in one game we ended up in a fist fight with each other when the opposing team was in our zone. They were so shocked one player just left the puck to watch and Devitt dashed down the ice to score on an uncontested breakaway. Why we didn’t do that more often I don’t know because it was actually a great strategy.
In 1987 we had a three-person photography department helmed by Elwood Ferguson, David Rossiter and Kevin Kooy. Gary Harker, Pat Sullivan and Dave Sulz all did desk duty I think. Trish Brayne was lifestyles editor. Reporters when I started included Sherri Gallant who now works for Alberta Health Services, a person I occasionally contact for stories and who makes regular submissions here. John Grainger, who roomed with Jensen was here and played hockey also was a reporter and the auto reviewer. John and I still keep touch on Twitter regularly. Other reporters included Peter Scott, Lyn Ens, Leona Flim, Carolin Vesely, Lori Turyk and Karen Solie. Joanne Helmer was also in the newsroom but I can’t remember if she was a reporter, a desker or both.
Shirley Plontke and Cheryl Crowe – who had a glorious vine in the backyard of her and Bob’s home that my springer spaniel Tod once destroyed – did a job- share inputting copy.
In this career, which now spans more than 42 years, I’ve covered a lot of bases, so to speak, since my start as a sports and outdoors writer.
I’ve written about homes, gardens, entertainment, new vehicles, virtually everything and I’ve had the opportunity to produce this weekly column here and in Ontario. In my entertainment career, I’ve interviewed everyone from Bo Diddly and Alice Cooper to Carrie Underwood, Ice Cube, Johnny Reid and Tommy Hunter, who I got on such good terms with on our occasional talks we ended up spending most of the allotted time talking about our dogs.
As an auto writer, name a vehicle and I’ve reviewed it, especially Subarus, Sentras and Jettas.
My career has been one of diversity including last week when I photographed games on a ball diamond for the first time since 1987 and wrote my first ball stories since then with the Canadian Junior Little League championships being staged here. I definitely lost my touch with the camera over those 35 years – sports photography is a true art that takes real effort, a good eye and some luck to do it right. And I don’t feel I did the on-field action justice.
But even after these many years, I’m not one to quit trying. I’m as hungry as ever to do the best job I can no matter what I’m covering and I’m blessed to have that opportunity. And I have to say since getting back in the reporting pool, I’ve had the most fun doing my job in a very long time. I’m trying to put my own mark on council coverage and build bridges in the community, which is important for anyone in the media.
I’ll be the first to admit I love getting out and schmoozing. I know so many people in this city that when I show up to an event like the grand opening of Legacy Park Wednesday, I can easily get distracted by socializing when I should be setting up with my fellow media members.
And many people, including Wednesday at the park, regularly greet me on the street or in stores or at dog parks to talk about things that matter to them.
And while we as journalists certainly need to be critical and ask the tough questions, we have to try to be fair unlike so many others who can without any repercussions just spew whatever they want on social media.
Any of us who have the courage to put our names on our commentary know we have to take the bad with the good because we are in the public eye. And I’ve gotten a lot more good over the years than bad which tells me I must be doing something right.
And I’m looking forward to doing more of it after a break from the office.
Chat again in a couple of weeks.
Follow @albeebHerald on Twitter.
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Enjoy your holidays! After having to wear so many hats in the last few months you certainly deserve it. Let’s hope you get the staff you need to take some heat off so you can have some fun at work again.
One name not mentioned, is Gary Adams . . . who now lives beside the beach in Baja . . . playing guitar and his harmonica for the tourists. Talk about the heat . . . and then the hurricanes, a price to pay for living there though.
Enjoy your break and Happy 35th Anniversary!