William Henry Jackson style

Conductor on the platform of the "Rico" Business Car at Colorado Railroad Museum in Golden during Colorado Crossings 2026. Rob Carigan photo

 What's it like riding the "Rico," taking photos?

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

This weekend, I had just a taste of what it might have been like to ride the rails and shoot photos in the 1890s with William Henry Jackson in his traveling dark room in Colorado. I had a seat, regular class, on the next car ahead in the train. But when it stopped for de-boarding, I asked the conductor if I could drift on back through what was once Jackson's business car "Rico" at the end of the excursion train. 

The famed Western photographer William Henry Jackson used the Rio Grande Southern business car "Rico" (originally D&RG car
B-21) as his mobile home and darkroom during his iconic 1890s photography excursions through the rugged San Juan Mountains of Colorado. 

History of the "Rico" 

Construction & Rebuilding: 

The car was originally built as a standard passenger coach by Billmeyer & Small in 1880 for the Denver & Rio Grande (D&RG) railroad. In 1892, it was rebuilt into a business car and named "Rico".

William Henry Jackson Special: 

 Jackson utilized this narrow-gauge luxury car as a traveling office and photo studio, famously attaching it to RGS trains (like Engine No. 9) to capture breathtaking views of Lizard Head Pass and the surrounding mining country.
Renaming: In 1909, the car was briefly renamed "Montezuma," and later designated as B-21 in 1921.

Preservation:  

Following the abandonment of the Rio Grande Southern in 1951, the Rocky Mountain Railroad Club purchased and rescued the historic car.  Today, the meticulously restored RGS Business Car No. B-21 "Rico" has been beautifully preserved and is proudly exhibited as part of the permanent collection at the Colorado Railroad Museum located in Golden.

From History Colorado and Colorado Encyclopedia :

William Henry Jackson (1843–1942) was one of the best-known photographers of the American West. He is renowned for his photographs of Colorado’s mountain scenery, many of which show now-famous landmarks such as Mount of the Holy Cross, Garden of the Gods, Mesa Verde, and Royal Gorge. His photographs captured the vastness of Colorado’s beauty and helped lure many people to the state from the late nineteenth century onward.

Today, Jackson’s images provide Americans with a glimpse of the American West on the cusp of great change, helping them see what familiar landscapes looked like as humanity ushered in the age of industrial mining, timber harvesting, large-scale irrigation projects, and other modern developments.
 

Early Life :

William Henry Jackson was born to George Hallock Jackson and Harriet Maria Allen on April 4, 1843, in Keeseville, New York. Jackson learned to paint from his mother, a hobbyist. He worked as a colorist at photography studios in Troy, New York, and Rutland, Vermont, where he learned photographic technique. At the age of nineteen Jackson enlisted in the Civil War, serving for nine months in Company K of the Twelfth Vermont Infantry. While en route to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, Jackson’s regiment was diverted to Westminster, Maryland, to guard trains—missing one of the war’s bloodiest affairs. After the war, Jackson returned home, where he enjoyed landscape painting. A disagreement with his sweetheart precipitated Jackson’s move West.

In 1868 Jackson relocated to Omaha, Nebraska, and opened a photography studio with his brother Ed. A year later William married Mollie Greer. She and their baby died during childbirth in 1872. In 1873 Jackson married Emilie Painter. Their union produced three children: Clarence, Louise, and Hallie.
 

Hayden Survey :

A chance meeting with Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden, director of the United States Geological Survey of the Territories, changed the course of Jackson’s career. In early 1870, Jackson became the official photographer of the “Hayden Survey.” For nine seasons, Jackson worked with Hayden to document the landscape in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. In 1871 Jackson photographed the Yellowstone area, and his photographs helped convince members of Congress to designate Yellowstone as the nation’s first national park on March 1, 1872.

Over the next five years of the survey, Jackson photographed Colorado from its southwest corner across the Rocky Mountains. His photographic equipment consisted of bulky cameras supported by sturdy tripods, fragile glass plate negatives, and a portable darkroom, including bottles of chemicals. Jackson processed the negatives in the field, allowing him to see his results immediately. If he was dissatisfied, Jackson could wipe off the photographic emulsion and reuse the negative.

During the Colorado years of the survey, Jackson perfected his mountain views, photographed small towns, and took images of Native American life. He used a wide variety of photographic formats, from stereographs to spectacular, multiplate panoramas. His most popular subjects included several of Colorado’s Fourteeners, especially Mount of the Holy Cross. While Jackson made the first photographs of the Native American sites near Mesa Verde, the survey did not find the Cliff Palace, the most famous cliff dwelling in the area.
 

Photography Business: 

In 1879 Jackson, now a famous photographer, chose to open a studio in Denver. Jackson knew the state well, and with duplicate negatives from his survey work, he already had a strong inventory of Colorado views.

Commissions from the railroad industry supported Jackson for many years. He worked for the Baltimore & Ohio, Denver & Rio Grande, Mexican Central Railway, New York Central, Philadelphia & Reading, and the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe. Some provided private cars, allowing Jackson and his traveling companions the freedom to stop at any location. His photographs of beautiful scenery along the railroad routes were displayed in railroad offices, sold to tourists, and used as the basis for engravings published in brochures and advertisements. Even those unable to leave home could purchase Jackson’s photographs.

The economic downturn of 1893 devastated Colorado’s economy, including Jackson’s business. At the same time, photographic printing technology and publishing methods were rapidly evolving, making it easier to mass produce half-tones and gravures. The original photographic print held less value. In addition, amateur photography gained popularity with the introduction of Kodak cameras.

Jackson desperately needed to change his business model and increase cash flow. An offer to join the World’s Transportation Commission, a three-year project to document railways and other types of transportation around the world, fit the bill. Harper’s Weekly magazine agreed to publish illustrated articles about the trip, based on Jackson’s photographs. Jackson photographed scenes in Egypt, Ceylon, India, New Zealand, Siberia, and several other locations. Beset by budget problems, the trip lasted only eighteenth months.
 

Leaving Colorado: 

In 1897 Jackson joined the Detroit Publishing Company, a major photography firm. A year later, the Jacksons left Denver and moved to Detroit. Jackson, a partner with the firm, contributed 20,000 negatives to the business. The company specialized in converting black-and-white photographs to color lithographs called Photochroms. Jackson’s images, now mass-produced in a range of sizes that included newly popular postcards, were sold in stores, in hotels, and through mail-order catalogs. Jackson made photographs for the Detroit Publishing Company until 1903, when he took over the role of plant manager. The company thrived until after World War I, going bankrupt in 1924.

In 1924 Jackson moved to Washington, DC. He lived with his daughter and resumed his interest in landscape painting. In 1936 Jackson painted four murals, based on the four major nineteenth-century geologic expeditions, for display at the Interior Department building in Washington. Jackson’s ghost-written autobiography, Time Exposure, was published in 1940.

On June 30, 1942, at the age of ninety-nine, William Henry Jackson died in New York City. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, DC.

 

Fix locomotives, cars for passengers, business, liquid, gas, stock, freight

 The Cornelius W. Hauck Roundhouse at the Colorado Railroad Museum

 Round and round we go

 "I could go back to the railroad. I liked that job. "_ Sturgill Simpson

"Turntables have been a 'round' since the 1830s – and they're still in rotation." — BNSF Rail Talk: A reflection on the remarkable longevity of the railroad turntable. 

Getting aligned in the right direction 

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

 In the old days, you had to take your locomotive and all the rolling stock to railroad roundhouse to have those knuckleheads fix it, usually.

While some have been replaced by reversing loops (wyes), dozens of these vintage structures are still maintained for historical preservation and scenic train operations.

Railroad roundhouses are the garages and workshops for locomotives and cars. The Cornelius W. Hauck Roundhouse at the Colorado Railroad Museum was completed in 2000 and is named after one of the Museum’s founders. It has five stalls and houses the tools and equipment needed to restore and repair rolling stock. 

Roundhouse workers must have many skills to keep equipment in working order. Volunteer machinists, pipe fitters, carpenters, electricians, painters and upholsterers contribute more than 1,200 hours a month restoring and maintaining rolling stock at the Museum.

There are nine railroad roundhouses that still physically exist in Colorado in varying states — ranging from fully operational historic sites to abandoned foundations.

The remaining roundhouses across the state include:
• Colorado Railroad Museum Roundhouse (Golden): Built in 2000, this five-stall roundhouse features inspection pits and a machine shop used for restoring historic trains.
• Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad Roundhouse (Durango): A fully functioning, historic roundhouse originally built in 1881 that serves the famous narrow-gauge steam trains.
• Como Roundhouse (Como): Built by Italian stonemasons in 1881, this former Denver, South Park & Pacific Railroad facility is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is undergoing active preservation.
• Hugo Union Pacific Railroad Roundhouse (Hugo): Constructed in 1909, this is the only surviving brick roundhouse in the state associated with the pre-merger Union Pacific Railroad.
• Leadville Roundhouse (Leadville): Originally a narrow-gauge facility built by the Denver & Rio Grande, the building still stands and is used for storage.
• Tiny Town Railroad Roundhouse (Morrison): A miniature roundhouse built for the 15-inch gauge railway.
• Midland Terminal Railroad Roundhouse (Colorado Springs): The physical structure still exists but has been repurposed into commercial retail and mail space.
• Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad Roundhouse (Colorado Springs): The structure survives but has also been repurposed for non-railroad use.
• Burlington Route (Denver): Two stalls remain of the old Chicago, Burlington & Quincy roundhouse and are integrated into a current shop building.
Additionally, there are several locations where faint visual remains or foundation outlines can still be seen—such as in La Junta and La Salle. 

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We still need to turn a profit — or do we?

 

From Dec. 2007 issue of Newspapers & Technology

‘Still eating’ good advice for newspapers confronting challenges
By Rob Carrigan
 

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His answer was always the same: “Still eating.”

Rain or shine, good times or bad, my grandfather always answered that way when anybody asked him, “How is it going?” or “How are you?” or “How do you do?”

He had other little endearing comments and sayings of course (for example, calling black table pepper the Sioux word for fly poop).

But “Still eating,” was his trademark and it reflected his hardscrabble existence as a homestead rancher on the Western Slope of Colorado.
After years in the community newspaper business, I have adopted a similar stance. Today, circulation is harder to keep up. Advertising is more difficult to find, and it often has to be shared with others. Nobody respects us. And the margins seem thinner than the air at 14,000 feet.

Still, it is a fun business. Something new every day, plenty of interaction in the thick of things and a newspaper knows what’s going on around town. These all are definite benefits. However, we need to turn a profit — or do we?

Another view

Maybe not. Consider media critic Mark Glaser of MediaShift, who makes a case for citizen ownership of the Los Angeles Times.

“Already, a handful of newspapers have survived and thrived owned by charitable trusts as non-profits. These include the St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times (owned by the Poynter Institute) and the Union Leader in Manchester, N.H. (owned by the Nackey S. Loeb School of Communications).

“They’re not setting the business world on fire, but that’s not the point. The idea is for the newspaper to make enough money to continue serving the public, without the pressures of more, more, more profits from Wall Street,” writes Glaser.

As readers take greater control in other ways like helping to create transparent and inclusive newsrooms and becoming more interested in the news gathering process as citizen journalists, it is only a wee leap to run the business-side of things, he contends.

At a smaller scale, it might even be more conceivable.

Serving a need

Jordan Moss, editor of the non-profit Norwood News in the Bronx, N.Y., says non-profit newspapers can be powerful tools that unite communities and shed light on issues overlooked by the mainstream press.

“As media companies continue to merge and grow, the news gets further and further away from ordinary people’s lives and concerns,” wrote Moss in 2002. “Neighborhoods without their own newspapers have little access to local news and information. At a time when urban issues have faded from state and national political agendas, the absence of a widely read record of the issues confronting urban communities is even more serious.”

Personally, I have competed against strong not-for-profit papers and it is an interesting exercise.

Volunteer workforces, inexpensive advertising and far-reaching circulation efforts that were never designed to make money can be tough competition in comparison to charging ad rates that need to keep up with industry norms.

In many cases, these “philanthropic” papers appear because a need exists and the private sector is not paying close enough attention or providing an adequate outlet.

Stymied by MSM

In short, organizers created the papers because they felt roadblocked by traditional media.

Market forces were ignored. The readers, or advertisers, or others, asked for something and when they didn’t get it, somebody figured out a way. Thus, non-profit becomes a viable option.

Maybe the non-profit model is not that far-fetched.

After all, circulation might not be as challenging to maintain. Advertising support might be less difficult to find. If our focus was “philanthropic,” readers could find it in their hearts to respect us. And we wouldn’t have to worry about thinner margins.

We would likely have to slim down a bit.

But as my grandfather was prone to say, we would be “Still eating.”

Rob Carrigan is in the sales and business development group of weekly newspaper publisher Colorado Publishing Co., a Dolan Media Co. unit based in Colorado Springs. He can be reached at robcarrigan1@gmail.com.
 

Like gardening, or gold mining, at one time

 

Six men are gathered on the front deck of the The Crusher, the first newspaper in Fremont (Cripple Creek, Teller County), Colorado. Oakley Spell, a young boy, holds a bundle of newspapers under his arm; a sign on the log building reads: "The Crusher." The Crusher was the Teller County ancestor of the following three papers I managed at the time: Ute Pass Courier in Woodland Park, the Gold Rush in Cripple Creek and the Extra in Teller County, all ASP Westward LP weeklies in Colorado.
 Date: 1891 W. H. Jackson sample album. Colorado Book IV. no. 33
Creator: Jackson, William Henry, 1843-1942. 

Watching your garden,
and newspaper, grow

From September 2006 editon of Newspapers & Technology
By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com 

Managing newspapers is like managing a garden.
You really can’t make things grow; you can only try to establish and maintain conditions that help the various plants take off and hopefully produce.
You need to watch where you position specific varieties in your pre-planning or the pumpkins will cross with the squash, and the corn will block the sun that the beans need.
Likewise, with a newspaper, you don’t want your TMC shopper choking the main news product to death.
Not too long ago, a publisher could simply scratch a shallow hole in the dirt, drop some seed money into it, make sure it received plenty of water and maybe spread a little manure over it now and then.

With a little hard work and luck, that same publisher would be able to reap a substantial harvest. Today, with all the new fertilizers and other technology flying around, making the right choices to grow a newspaper is that much more complicated.

Free versus paid
Take, for example, the “free versus paid” discussion, which is somewhat akin to “volunteer” seeding versus planting.
Because of churn ratios and other factors relating to the cost of circulation sales, some metro dailies are now paying more to maintain paid circulation than it would cost them to give everyone in a market a free paper. And they are losing the war as paid circulation continues to lose ground.
At the same time, readers, and more importantly, advertisers, are becoming less impressed with paid circulation, especially when some of the best things in life now are free.
In the words of Craig McMullin, executive director for the Association of Free Community Papers, “Give people something they need free and create an audience and the advertisers will pay the freight.”
But that is not the complete answer for newspapers.
Our competitors have also figured that out. The business models of Craigslist, Google and to some extent, eBay, all are based on the same principle.

Redefining roles
Additionally, even as newspapers redefine their marketing, the role of journalism itself is being recrafted.
Dan Gillmor’s recent book, “We the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People,” explores that possibility.
“Technology has given us the communications toolkit that allows anyone to become a journalist at little cost... Nothing like this has ever been remotely possible before.” Gillmor wrote.
To Gillmor, news is no longer a lecture in which the media tells you what the news is. Instead, it’s a conversation, with blurred lines between producers and consumers of that news.

Embracing change
Gillmor’s suggestion: Media needs to embrace those changes by encouraging readers to become a big part of the process. Facilitate event blogs that let readers contribute and become a part of the coverage, he says. Ask for and post readers’ information, pictures and audio so they become extensions of limited staffs and resources.
Today, a person with a cell phone or other digital device might be able to produce the photos or audio clips nearly as easy as the major players in the news business.
The bright spot? The news industry’s traditional weeding function will help it survive.
After all, with all the citizen reporting and info gathering taking place in the democratization of the news, it’s more necessary than ever for a good editor to take the hoe to those pesky mistakes, misinformation, hoaxes, spin doctoring and other weeds that can render the garden plot useless.

At the time of this writing, Rob Carrigan specialized in prepress systems for weekly newspapers. He was the publisher of the Ute Pass Courier in Woodland Park, the Gold Rush in Cripple Creek and the Extra in Teller County, all ASP Westward LP weeklies in Colorado. He can be reached by e-mail at robcarrigan1@gmail.com

Love paper business so much, couldn't make the change

Newspapers in the information business?

This post first appeared in Newspapers & Technology in January, 2007.

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

I don’t know how many times in the last year I’ve heard someone with their feet mired in the traditional ink-on-paper newspaper business try to argue that he is really in the information business.

Some of those characters even believe it. But the cement around their ankles and thought processes keeps them slogging away with the old models and methods while the world changes quickly around them.

Tim McGuire, editor and senior vice president of the (Minneapolis) Star Tribune, is quoted on the subject in “The Art of Leadership in News Organizations” by Shelby Coffey III.

“Many people have heard the old story about railroads and how they should have realized they were in the transportation business in the same way newspapers ought to realize they are in the information business,” according to McGuire. “I heard someone else say a few years ago that in fact the railroad people knew they needed to be in the transportation business. They just loved the railroads so much they couldn’t make the change. There is a lot of that in our business.” Indeed there is.

Under attack

From adapted news cycles, changing views in objective journalism, and generally trying to come up with new ways of paying the bills, traditional newspapers quite correctly feel like the business is under attack.

And what is the natural reaction when under attack? Usually, hunker down in a hole and keep your head down. But if it doesn’t look like that is going to work, maybe it is time to try a counter-attack, or, alternatively, come out of the hole with all guns blazing.

In a world of instant feedback and precise, automated ad targeting — a lot of us waited far too long before coming out of that hole with guns blazing.

It is a bit like the scene in “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” where the whole Bolivian army is waiting.

“The losers are likely to be those companies that try to make money by pouring old-media wine into the new Web bottles,” notes Business 2.0 magazine in its March edition. “The winners will be the players that invent new ways to tap into what the Web brings to the party; instant feedback, instant analysis, and the collective wisdom of a billion users.”

Advertisers and the agencies that represent them have become much more savvy in finding out what works and what doesn’t — in a very short amount of time — and they vote with their wallets.

We have gone way past the days when someone could say, “Half of my advertising works like a charm and half does me absolutely no good, but the trouble is, I’m not sure which half is which.”

For example, ad agency Ogilvy & Mather now uses a software optimizer that runs 5,000 to 10,000 calculations every time it evaluates how well an ad campaign is working.

Dynamic results

With that data, the agency is able to pull non-performing ads right away or adapt the campaigns on the fly. And some advertising vendors on the Web have gone to a pay-for-performance program in which publishers only get paid for advertising if it sells product or creates verifiable results in the form of leads or an order.

Imagine if newspapers went to such a system.

The unfortunate truth of the matter is that newspapers, with a few exceptions, don’t even do a very good job of keeping track of their own vast stores of information, much less data tracking readers and how they use the information provided.

For that reason, I think a lot of the rhetoric about being in the information business is perhaps just wishful thinking.

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Who is a journalist?

Type from the Hell Box in lockup.

“The liberty of the press is most generally approved when it takes liberties with the other fellow, and leaves us alone.” — Edgar Watson Howe, 1911.

Just because you can type, 

it doesn't mean you are journalist

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

This article first appeared in the May 2007 edition of "Newspapers & Technology." Having spent nearly 40 years in the 'legitimate press,' I currently blog at https://coloradopresslessnative.blogspot.com and http://coloradorestlessnative.blogspot.com.

We are all "the Press," and always have been.

 Who qualifies as “press”? The proliferation of blogs and other new technology is forcing journalists and professional associations to hammer out new ways of defining who’s eligible for press credentials. Consider what’s happened in Washington, D.C., where the Capitol Correspondent’s Association recently rewrote its rules governing who can sit in congressional press galleries.

The rules are strict, requiring applicants to prove that they are a full-time, paid correspondent who requires “on-site access to congressional members and staff.”

In addition, applicants must be employed by a periodical that can qualify under General Publication mailing privileges under U.S. Postal Service rules and publishes daily, or employed by an organization that disseminates original news and opinion and has been publishing continuously for at least 18 months.

Leaves us out, but …

 That sort of leaves out us poor, pitiful weekly newspaper folk, but, hey, who wants to listen to Congress all day anyway.
The organization goes on to exclude anybody who does not live in the Washington area and firmly disallows any lobbying, paid advocacy, advertising, publicity or promotion work.

Yet the advent of blogging and digital punditry has transformed the business. Anybody with a computer and access to a Web site can call himself a member of the press. But merely evoking the term, much like wishing for a winning lottery ticket, doesn’t necessarily make it so.

I write about this because of my role on the board of the Colorado Press Association, which has been asked to consider issuing stricter guidelines about who can obtain press credentials.

Main concern

 The main fear many have, I believe, is that by somehow posing as “legitimate press,” bloggers could further damage our already shaky reputations. But maybe some of the MSM’s reluctance is that it wants to remain exclusive and thus not admit any new members. After all, what we do is so important it forced the nation’s forefathers to make the first make-good to nothing less than the U.S. Constitution.

Bloggers, of course, have an association of their own (at least one) and they continue to flex their collective muscles as well.

Most recently, the Media Bloggers Association, a 1,000-member organization working to extend powers of the press to bloggers, was able to secure access for two blogger seats in the 100 seats reserved for media in the “Scooter” Libby trial.

 Blogging status

 Additionally, another blogger, Garrett M. Graff, became the first blogger to be granted a daily White House pass for the specific purpose of writing a Web log in early 2005, according to The New York Times.
In Graff’s case, his quest for White House press credentials was actually helped by members of the White House Correspondents Association.
In ensuring the invitation to Graff, the WHCA wanted to make sure it alone was responsible for redrafting the rules defining a legitimate journalist, according to The Times.

I think that point is well taken. It is up to journalists to define for themselves what is proper and correct in the context of associations and organizations offering professional credentials. But it is probably up to the public to determine whether those credentials mean anything in the future.

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Mountain-based newspapers face unique challenges

 Former Colorado Governor Ralph Carr and internationally-known newsman Lowell Thomas started their careers at mountain newspapers in Teller County.

Hillbilly newspapering tricks from the high country

From March 2001 edition of Newspapers & Technology, a nationally-distributed trade journal. At the time, I specialized in pre-press systems for weekly newspapers and was the publisher of the Ute Pass Courier in Woodland Park, the Gold Rush in Cripple Creek, and the Pikes Peak Journal in Manitou Springs, all Westward Communications Inc. weeklies in Colorado.

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com 

In an effort to put information together on the technology challenges of operating in the mountains, I went through my e-mail contacts and asked for tips, tricks and any interesting stories about the subject. Following are some of the more colorful responses I received.

“All the time we owned newspapers in Alaska, not once did we have to use sled dogs to get copy to the printer. Hard to believe, isn’t it?” wrote Mike Lindsey of Media Consultants Inc. Lindsey is my former employer and one-time owner of papers in Wyoming, Alaska, Idaho and Arizona. “We had one of the most modern newspapers in the state — all state-of-the-art, Macintosh-driven, Photoshop, etc. We even had the capability to modem our paper to the printer.

“Alaska is an extremely progressive state, and we found our employees very capable and willing to learn new technology. Several of our longtime employees were natives and our best workers. Our biggest problem was with employees — people from the lower 48 (states) who wanted an Alaska experience, but headed home after the first cold and dark winter. 

"Some employees were late in the winter because frequently a moose would be in their driveway, and they couldn’t get to their car. And in the summer and during hunting season, we had a high degree of absenteeism — when the salmon are running, workers want to fish, and during the fall, workers want to hunt. It made for a very flexible staff,” Lindsey said. “Sorry, I can’t help you with the equipment. We did send our photographers out on float planes, dogsleds and snow machines to get stories. Advertising reps hit the streets pretty much as all reps do.” 

Suzy Meyer, the editor and general manager at the Cortez (Colo.) Journal, had this warning for me:
“Our hillbilly tip is to never discard old technology, because one never knows when the new technology will fail. We still have Linotypes stashed away. Yes, we’d have to pull a page proof, shoot it and go to plate, but hey, we could get words on a page,” she said. 

Also responding from the other end of the Centennial state was Robin Kepple, editor of the Bailey and Fairplay Flume. 

“We serve all of Park County, which is difficult because the county is quite large,” Kepple said. “It is about 90 miles from my office to the town of Guffey, Colo. Fortunately, I have a good correspondent in that town. Our county seat, where many of our stories take place, is 40 miles away in Fairplay. I keep a reporter there full time.

“Digital cameras, laptop computers and e-mail have been a godsend for us with such a long distance between towns. However, we only have a 56k modem and no high-speed Internet access. It sometimes takes 30 minutes to download digital images from e-mail, but that is still faster than driving to other towns, picking up film, driving back and processing film,” he stated.

“The slow Internet speed also causes frustration when we are trying to send our pages to the print shop in Salida, Colo., about 100 miles away. We send the files as PDFs in order to work with their new imagesetter. Occasionally, we have technical problems that cause us a lot of grief; however, as any good newspaper staff should, we persevere and still manage to get the paper out.”
Robert Gibson, interactive media manager at billingsgazette.com, the Web site for the Billings (Mont.) Gazette, noted the following phenomenon: “In eastern Montana, people are sparse with dozens of miles between houses and ranches. Those ranches, however, are small businesses that need accountants and [others] to operate. Ranchers, farmers and their accountants have found that keeping records on a computer is far easier than in a shoebox,” Gibson explained.

 “As a result, and contrary to conventional wisdom, farms and ranches are well-wired with nearly twice the computer penetration as in town. And once they discover computers and the Internet, they discover e-mail, real-time commodity futures, real-time weather and entertainment in places where TV cable does not exist.

“The telephone co-op in eastern Montana discovered the same phenomenon and made itself an Internet service provider. A call to the server is local from any place on the co-op phone network, so there is no long distance charge for dial-up Internet service, even though the nearest server may be five counties away,” Gibson said.

“Simply recognizing that unlikely agricultural demographic’s potential prompted us to do some soft marketing to them and target them with some daily breaking news copy. Today they are a significant, fast-growing part of our online audience.” 

And back in Colorado, near my boyhood stomping grounds, David Mullings, the publisher of the Ouray County Plaindealer, The Ridgway Sun, The Silverton Standard and The Miner offers the following anecdotes:
“Because of an uncooperative printer who was extraordinarily proud of his work (read: charging double), we used to print the Ridgway and Ouray newspapers in Denver — yes, 300 miles, each way, every week. We did this by flying our flats from Montrose, Colo., on a commuter flight [every Wednesday at 1 p.m.].

 “The folks at Intermountain Color picked them up at the airport, which when DIA was built, meant going halfway to Kansas. They printed Wednesday evening and shipped it on a Denver Post truck at midnight. We picked up papers in Montrose at 8 a.m. on Thursday. I got to watching the snowfall levels on Vail Pass pretty closely and had to rummage around some trucking warehouses a couple of times to find that week’s news,” he writes.
The papers are now printed at the Montrose Daily Press. Mullings also deals with problems only a few miles away, but on the other side of the world.

 “I took over the Silverton Standard and The Miner last June. It’s two mountain passes to our printer, the Durango Herald, and we take the paper on a Zip disc in digital form.

 “My idea: Send it down over the phone lines. But then how to get it back? The rails of the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad run right by the Herald loading dock, and they run three trains in the summer. [My idea was to] send the paper down via a 21st century vehicle, and get it back with one from the 19th century. I never put the brainstorm into action because of slow phone lines in Silverton, and we’re switching Silverton to print in Montrose in 2001.

“The Silverton paper, right now, goes over three of the meanest (mountain) passes in America to get from our printer in Durango to our mailroom in Ouray. That stretch of Highway 550 is the most avalanche-prone in the country, and we’ll no doubt have some fun this winter. We are letting the Lake City paper be the guinea pig with the Montrose Daily Press in transmitting PDF files via phone line, but plan to ship all three that way,” Mullings said.

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