A Fitting Farewell

I couldn’t help but feel a little envious when I read a column in today’s newspaper. It was by long-time newspaperman Ken Burger, who is retiring from the local paper, The Post and Courier. His farewell column published today.  In it, he describes his first experience with the newspaper world and the intoxicating feel of the newsroom.

He shares some of the people he’s met – both famous and not – and some of the moments he’s captured – both monumental and not. He says, for him, the newspaper business was “love at first sight.” It was for me too, Ken. Oh how I loved the hum of a newspaper – the click of keyboards, the ringing of phones, the crackle of the police scanner. I loved seeing my byline in print, knowing I was part of something important and feeling that I was making a difference.

Journalists share a sense of duty, a belief they have been called to be the watchdogs of the world, the messengers of information and the voice of the voiceless.

Burger spent 40 years in the news business. I spent just 10 before the world turned the newspaper business on its ear. The newspaper world I dreamed of doesn’t really exist anymore and it’s sad. People like Ken Burger are a dying breed and even those of us who longed to write a farewell column after 40 or more years in the industry have found there’s not a place for us.