This column marks the beginning of my 10th summer working part time at the Star Herald.
In 2014, Editor Lori asked me if I could help as a part-time reporter for a few weeks that summer when the position was open.
General manager Rick agreed, and my temporary fill-in gig began.
It wasn’t quite as random as it may seem, however.
When I graduated high school, I thought journalism was going to be my college major before I decided to go into teaching.
I had been a fan of newspapers since Mr. Olson introduced us to the Star Tribune in his fifth-grade classroom.
My mom made sure to buy a Star Herald during her lunch break on Thursdays so it would be at home for me to read after school.
When I was in college, she saved the Star Heralds for me to read when I came home.
During the year I lived near the Twin Cities, I got a subscription to the Star Herald to make sure I kept up with the news from Luverne.
For much of my teaching career, I’ve requisitioned Star Tribune newspapers for use in my own classroom and continue to do so.
So, my relationship with newspapers, my love of writing, and my interest in sharing news from my hometown made the Star Herald a natural part-time job in the summer of 2014.
That summer I learned some tough lessons right away from Editor Lori.
Do not take photos for the paper without people in the photo.
Do not take photos for the paper with people’s feet “cut off.”
Do not write that an event “was held” in your articles.
And many more.
But I’m a relatively quick learner and was able to adapt quickly enough that they kept letting me write … and occasionally take photos.
By the next summer, reporter Mavis was hired (thankfully) and my Star Herald role moved into covering for vacations and other reporting jobs as needed.
Sports editor John always took vacation for two weeks in June, so I found my way into writing about sports.
After sports editor John retired, I morphed into the summer “sports guy” for a few years and began covering mostly Junior Legion, Legion and Redbirds baseball.
And now, here we are.
Thankfully, we have a “new” sports editor, Greg, who is doing great and is a far, far better photographer than I am. The sports pages look great!
I’m back to writing news articles and will be covering some local government and other features throughout the summer.
Looking back 10 years, it’s amazing how much things have changed … but also how much they have stayed the same.
Luverne continues to be an active place with lots of news that the Star Herald does an outstanding job covering and documenting.
And they still let me help do that in the summers — as long as there are people in photos and those people’s feet are in the frame.