Off the Press
March 6, 2012
Time flies when making a lifetime of memories
Bob Taylor Press sports editor
Mr. Hune was a very insightful teacher. In my ninth-grade yearbook he wrote “to a future newspaper reporter.”
How did he know?
I do not believe Mr. Hune, who taught the newspaper class at my junior high school, realized I would later venture into an enjoyable career that would last 40 years.
Forty years — sometimes it does not seem I just started yesterday. In 1972, when my career started, “The Godfather” was playing at most cinemas. Regular gasoline cost just 36 cents a gallon and postage stamps were only 10 cents. Three Dog Night and Moody Blues were some of the hit bands.
And on a sunny June afternoon in 1972 I graduated from Western Washington University. I had no time for the congratulations from two aunts who came to the graduation ceremony, because I had to go to work. I had recently been hired by the Bellingham Metropolitan, a new, enterprising, weekly newspaper that expected to challenge the established Bellingham Herald for the reading audience. My assignment was to write a story about the graduation. With diploma in hand, I raced to the office to write my first professional story on a Royal typewriter.
Off the Press
February 28, 2012
Bob Taylor, we will miss you far more than you can know
Bob Taylor. I had heard of him before I even met him.
Kathleen Merrill Press managing editor
He is a legend in the sports community, I am sure many people will tell you. I certainly will.
People at the South County Journal used to talk about him in hushed, reverent tones. He had been at the paper’s predecessor, the Journal American, for many years. And in his career, he worked nearly every sports beat there was.
His list of career highlights began in 1972, when he graduated from college and was hired by the weekly Bellingham Metropolitan. In between then and now, he has covered many teams, including the Seattle Mariners. There is no way I could do justice to his career in this small space.
I think nowhere is he more well-known and beloved than on the Eastside. He has worked here at The Press since 2000, covering prep sports. I was thrilled when I applied for this job and found out that he worked here.
Off the Press
February 21, 2012
Fair predicted a brave new world 50 years ago
Warren Kagarise Press reporter
From a standpoint 50 years later and a dozen years into the 21st century, some ideas — flying cars, outer space colonies — presented at the Century 21 Exposition seem more quaint than far-fetched.
The idea of Greater Seattle as a technology hub, however, lingers long after the world’s fair closed in October 1962.
For a piece in the wintertime Issaquah Living magazine, I set out to collect local fairgoers’ memories from the heady days before and during the Century 21 Exposition. (Readers can find the magazine tucked amid the sales circulars in the B section.)
I heard the same question again and again from colleagues, family and friends as I reported the piece: “Do cities still put on world’s fairs?”
The answer is yes. Shanghai hosted Expo 2010 and Expo 2012 is scheduled to open in Yeosu, South Korea, in May.
Off the Press
February 14, 2012
To our Hall of Famer and MVP, Bob Taylor
Hey Bob,
Greg Farrar Press photographer
You are an awesome sports editor, and your decision to bow out on March 9 to pursue your book-writing projects is going to make my transition from black-and-white film to color-digital photography seem like a piece of cake.
Thank you so much for the 12 years of wisdom and experience you have brought to your sports section. We hardly deserved to have you, considering your 19 “and-a-half” previous years covering Eastside sports for the old Journal-American. Any daily newspaper around Puget Sound would have been a better one with you on its staff.
It always amazed me when covering an event with you to see how grown dads and even coaches would approach you to reminisce about the times you covered their own high school athletic careers. You’re like the living encyclopedia of Eastside sports, and whenever it was relevant, any story you wrote could link to the past of a school’s athletic program.
We’ve had more time on the road together than I’ve spent with any other reporter in this business. No trip to Bellingham, Tacoma or Yakima ever seemed too long as we gabbed away the miles. I learned about your growing up in the southwest corner of the state, your awesome love for your wife Pauline and son David, and how you’ve worked with quite a few interesting characters, some sober and some inebriated, over the years.
Off the Press
February 7, 2012
State of health care can make one sick
Tom Corrigan Press reporter
OK. This just makes me sad and angry. And frustrated. All at the same time.
Someone I know just received some of the most devastating news you can get, summed up succinctly in one word: cancer. Two ugly, evil, little syllables that can completely change your life and that of those around you.
So how do you react upon finding out those syllables have targeted you? And your family and friends, who are going to be affected by whatever comes next? The first feeling to arrive has to be disbelief, followed quickly by fear. Fear, and then probably anger and hopelessness. I’m sure I don’t need to point out what a joyride this all isn’t.
Off the Press
January 31, 2012
Joys of eating lutefisk — there’s none for me
Bob Taylor Press sports editor
My last name might fool you. Actually, I am half Finnish and darn proud of that heritage.
The half comes from my mother’s side of the family, or as she always said “my best half.” Her father, Peter Kopra, came over from Finland in the late 1890s in hopes of striking it rich in the gold fields. Grandpa Peter never found gold, but he did discover the United States was a land of opportunity.
After securing a job down in California, he saved enough money to bring over Grandma and the rest of the family, which at the time included two boys. He also purchased a farm in Southwest Washington.
It was on this farm where my mother was born. It was later on a section of the farm, which my parents purchased from one of my uncles, where I was raised.
In this community, the last name Taylor was unique because most families were Finns, Swedes and Norwegians. However, I grew up proud of most Scandinavian traditions.
But there was one tradition I could never partake in — eating lutefisk.
Off the Press
January 24, 2012
Another winter storm, and not so prepared
Debbie Berto Press publisher
Storm coming, so get prepared. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The weatherman never gets it right.
My husband Tom and I are certified members of a CERT — Citizen Emergency Response Team — here in Issaquah.
Sadly, we found ourselves not so prepared last week.
On Tuesday, Tom suggested he should charge the generator. He didn’t follow through, but it did start when the power/phone/Internet/cable went out Thursday morning.
But we only had two gallons of gas on hand to keep the generator going. Uh oh.
Tom siphoned some gas from the 4-wheeler but learned that our cars have anti-siphon devices. A call to the police department confirmed that The Grange did have gas and a generator to pump it, and about 40 cars in line for it. We decided to wait for city power to return.
Off the Press
January 17, 2012
Lessons learned in fire and ice
Warren Kagarise Press reporter
Journalism often requires reporters to meet people under undesirable circumstances — behind police tape or against a flickering backdrop of emergency lights.
Under such circumstances, we strive for compassion, but sometimes, we forget about the people on the other side of the notebook amid the clamor to chase down a story or ferret out some key detail.
I experienced a story on the other side of the notebook early Jan. 16 and, hopefully, came away a little more enlightened and understanding.
Just before 4 a.m., a neighbor pounded on the door to my apartment in Seattle’s Queen Anne neighborhood.
“Get out! There’s a fire!” he yelled, and then headed down the corridor to warn sleeping occupants in other apartments.
Off the Press
January 10, 2012
Eatin’ away heartache — Issaquah style
Christina Lords Press reporter
This isn’t something I’d wish on a worst enemy — even you, Celine Dion.
It creeps up on me when I wake up in the morning. That instant thought of … something really bad happened, didn’t it? And then I remember. And it hits me with shock and awe, like a pie to the face.
I’ve cried, sure. I’ve also rotated through the five stages of grief. Why is it that the whole denial phase always seems so much more attractive than, say, that … wait, what is that last one? Acceptance?
Yeah. Acceptance. I’ve been dumped.
Off the Press
December 20, 2011
It’s the little things that really matter
Kathleen Merrill Press managing editor
They say it’s better to give than receive. I think both feel pretty good.
In my mind, though, giving lasts longer.
Purse strings have gotten tighter for many people in the past couple of years, and it’s hard to give to others when you’re receiving less.
Then again, I think many people overthink giving on a regular basis. We see pleas for $50 or $100, or sometimes even more (such as in the case of tickets to fundraising events). I don’t know about you, but I often can’t afford $50, let alone more than that.
However, even as paychecks and benefits have gotten smaller, many people have found ways to give. I was thinking about this the other day when the reporting staff was discussing the subject of compassion fatigue. People do get tired of being asked to give when their expenses are going up and their salaries are not going up to match.
But here’s something I’ve learned: Even the smallest things count to someone with little or nothing.
