We met from Tuesday to Thursday in the last week of the month. It was a sporadic group that had no clear direction, but everyone knew what to do. The work on The Potrero View in the 1980s and early 1990s was a routine that never ended. Every month was different.
The three main architects were Ruth Passen, our celebrated editor-in-chief, Vas Arnautoff, who designed the layout and wrote the headlines, and Judy Baston, who did pretty much everything. Over the course of the month they collected the articles and typed them up on our IBM Selectric typewriters. In the final week we cut them out and reassembled them on plates for the printer.
There was a quiet commotion, the floor was littered with scraps of paper, scalpels and glue sticks laid out at the ready, and the constant clicking of typewriters and the “Headliner,” a machine with a large tank that photographed the letters from a large wheel onto a strip of film. Bob Hayes cleaned the machine every month and primed it with new developer and fixer. We had typewriter erasers, white pens, blue pencils, dictionaries, a backlit light table, and pizza on Thursdays!
Thursdays were full of volunteers. Ruth ordered two or three Goat Hill pizzas with anchovies on the side. Those were the best times; everyone talked politics and discussed the articles.
We were dinosaurs in a pre-computerized world. Considering how much progress has been made in the art of publishing, why are newspapers slowly disappearing?
My nephew from Florida was visiting recently and laughed at me when I did my daily chronicle laid out on the table.
“I haven’t seen anyone reading a newspaper in years!”
“What else is there to read?” I thought as my nephew pulled out his phone and started scrolling without actually reading anything.
I’ve tried reading articles on my phone, but the ads just pop up and take over. Pop-ups at the top, a permanent ad at the bottom, ads embedded everywhere. Some wiggle, most repeat constantly, some blink. Don’t touch any of them because what you wanted to read will disappear.
Why is this better than a newspaper? The articles are immobile. You can turn the page without finishing an article. The ads don’t shout at you. You can even put your coffee cup on the paper without damaging it.
What does the future of newspapers look like? I cannot predict it with certainty, but I believe the future of newspapers is right in your hands. Small newspapers like The Potrero View will continue to seek out news and information ignored by larger dailies. Local citizens will spend time at meetings that won’t stop, feeling compelled to write something and spread it throughout the larger community. Zoning issues and street changes only need to be read once a month anyway. Small businesses in the community will always outperform larger businesses. You’ll never meet your neighbors at the drive-thru. Readers will feel a lack of information and turn to small, fledgling newspapers, and the cycle begins again.
This article will be here tomorrow and all month long. It will be on my coffee table until at least November. Try that on your Snapchat.
