Gathering the news is hard work

The 132nd annual convention of the Colorado Press Association, Feb. 26-27 in Denver, has just drawn to a close. The staff at our local Times-Call did quite well—as usual—in the concurrent newspaper contests to prove once again that Longmont has one of the best newspapers in the state. This recognition comes not by accident; it takes good management with a lot of hard work by a lot of dedicated people. In all of industry and forms of communication, for advertisers nothing is quite like paid-circulation newspapers—people will voluntarily pay to read them.

Founded by William Byers in 1859, Colorado’s first newspaper--while still a territory—was of course the Rocky Mountain News. The press association wasn’t formed until 1878. Its first president was W.B. Vickers who had been part owner of the Rocky (1876-78) but moved on to edit the daily Denver Tribune.

The Denver Post, a relatively newcomer to the scene, was started by George Herbert and W. P. Caruthers in 1892. Three years later, Frederick Bonfils and Harry Tammen took over the Post and it blossomed to finally outlast the competing Rocky. Gene Fowler’s book “Timberline” tells about this pair who are probably the most familiar characters in Denver’s newspaper history. A personal favorite of mine on the Denver scene was always Gene Cervi, who was adept at kicking the shins of the two powerful dailies.

But the newspaper game has changed. As Charles Krauthammer so eloquently opined in his recent column dealing with a different industry, the predicament he outlined is equally devastating to newspapers as they try to deal with “the high price of modernity.” But unlike the Internet, somebody has to go out and dig for the news and report it. Virtual news won’t do, and you won’t find much community news there.