This week, after having been responsible for the editorial content in about 1,950 issues of the Kamsack Times, I retired from the job I’ve more or less enjoyed for more than 40 years.
Although I had not anticipated a career in journalism, as it turned out, I had unknowingly been preparing for it my whole life. I had always been a news junkie, my doodles were often of type styles, stretched or squished and often rendered in 3-D. And alongside a major in psychology at the University of Manitoba, I had minor equivalents in English, history and philosophy, very good training grounds for a reporter, photographer and editor.
In September 1977 Ken Sopkow, owner of the Times, the Canora Courier and two other community newspapers, hired me as the reporter-photographer for this newspaper and I eagerly went to work, over the moon with joy for having landed such a wonderful job.
I was super lucky in that Ralph Davis, a former owner of the Times, the Courier and a former editor at the Regina Leader-Post, was working as the editor of Sopkow’s four newspapers. I soaked up everything he taught me and he appreciated being able to share with an eager student his skill and knowledge acquired from a long career in the business.
When I began, I was typing my stories on an electric typewriter and taking rolls and rolls of 35mm film into a darkroom for developing and printing. Because I had a particular interest in layout design, on printing day it became a habit for me to breathe over Davis’s shoulders as I watched as he laid out typed copy and photos onto the pages, thereby picking up the essential rules of the trade.
I was able to use that knowledge when we eventually transitioned to computers and desktop publishing software.
If allowed to briefly wander down memory lane, I recall that when I began, I had attended town council meetings presided over by Mayor Mike Nadane and councillors Larry Koturbash, Al Zabinsky and Gerald Shymko among others. Mel Laimon and Mike Sas were among the backbone of the community’s business sector.
Archie Olson bowled, Hope MacArthur and Marg Falkiner looked after the Parkland College, P.J. Wlasichuk was the hub of Club 55 and Harry Shukin was busy forming historical societies in Kamsack and Veregin.
I conducted interviews, took pictures and wrote stories of Steamer Hovorka, most of the Kinnear sisters, the Elks club, the Lions club and the Kamsack Dance and Multicultural Association. Literally, there was no end to it. A selection of the photos I have taken over the years have been tacked onto three large bulletin boards that currently decorate a wall in the Times’ office.
To do my job I made regular stops at the Kamsack schools which were the Victoria, Kamsack Collegiate Institute, Kamsack Junior High School and the Assiniboine School, plus two schools in each of Norquay and Pelly, as well as schools in Togo, Veregin, Arran and Stenen. Remember them?
For better or worse, I had become “the Kamsack Times guy,” or “Scoop” to some, and “Grape” (for grapevine) to others, and was responsible for chronicling the community, writing the publication of record.
I’ve accumulated stories on Kamsack’s movers and shakers, sleepyheads and reprobates in 1,950 or so issues of the paper, in addition to occasional supplements and special publications. That’s a lot of papers, a lot of people, a lot of pictures and a lot of stories.
As I retire as “the Kamsack Times guy” and editor of three weekly newspapers, many people have been asking, “What are you going to do now?”
Well, for sure, I’m going to purposefully not be aware of what’s happening in the community. I’m going to stay at home, which is reputed to be located in the centre of the universe, hopefully for many years, and I intend to clean up all the dust bunnies that have been growing larger and larger along all the baseboards. Whenever I want, I will be staying up all night and sleeping all day. I plan to watch all the movies and television one could possibly enjoy and make a few trips for extra excitement to the city or south to the sun. I’m going to walk, reduce my cholesterol level and maybe get back to tending a garden.
As a writer, who still gets his best jollies from reading something wonderful he’s written, I know I’m going to want to keep on writing, but of subjects somewhat different than the pieces that have been required by my occupation until now.
