One of these boxes became superfluous this morning.
If you’ve paid attention you know that this was the day when the Albany Democrat-Herald stopped publication and home delivery of the daily print newspaper, going to delivery by mail three days a week instead.
One of the dilemmas this posed for longtime customers was: What to do with the delivery tube?
Do we leave it on the mailbox post as a reminder of better days and a silent remonstrance against change? Or do we take it down? And if we take it down, do we put it in the trash, or can we put it to some kind of use?
As you can see, the choice in my case was to take it down. And my first impulse was to get rid of it.
But look, that seemed like too ignominious an end to that little tube. After all, it and its predecessors (most of them blue, if memory serves) had a daily function at this house for almost 46 years.
So, we looked for a place to put the thing. And here is where it ended up:
What is it now? A side yard decoration, maybe. A reminder, as though we needed another one, that in this world nothing lasts.
Maybe some of our feathered friends will take a look and say to themselves, “Hey, it may be plastic but we might be able to build a nest in there. Let’s give it a try.”
Assuming the newspaper company doesn’t want its delivery tube back. If they do, they know where it is. (hh)
I remember a Rocky and Bullwinckle show in which Boris and Natasha terrorized America by stealing everyone’s television antennas …
Hey Hasso, this could start a whole new phenomenon. “Show me what you did with your old newspaper delivery tube.” I’m sure you would get responses from all across the country, maybe the world! Maybe we would see them perched on street signs in Times Square or as a hood ornament on a Corvair? Tik-Tok will pick it up assuredly. Of course, you’d have to allow your readers to post images on your blog, sorta like Facebook. Or maybe not.
Adding to our collection that includes the Oregonian and Statesman-Journal.
Might mount to the fresh milk box (when it came in quarts&half gallons) on the back stoop, or might leave it, as is, for Amazon deliveries of small parcels.
Could Jeff Bezos extend his Washington Post empire to include Lee Enterprises? The Post’s Publisher Fred Ryan stepped down earlier this month, so there doesn’t seem to be a tech solution in the near term for print journalism.
My D-H box is waiting, where-is, in case that changes.
Print PRINT IS DEAD Scott
maybe a bury party?
Times change. The really unfortunate part is that it signals further decline in local reporting, which is a true threat to democracy.
The best thing to do is to keep your subscription going and reading on line.
And Hasso, maybe you ought to check in with Les Zaitz to see if maybe a Benton Reporter could be on the horizon. You certainly have the chops to help keep local reporting going, and you certainly have the experience to help train another younger generation.
For those who remember Seven Days every Friday on OPB, you can catch a view of a dashing young editor through the following link:
https://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-153-257d80c0
(It takes about 30 seconds to start up.)
“Seven Days” Always civil, balanced, and well done… I do miss that program!
With you on that Ray.
OPB/NPR/PBS still works that way. Too bad more people don’t want truth and reasoned discussions. They want combat instead.
Funny how Frontline does Republican “hit pieces” just before the elections. Anything against the Dems is after the elections and at least a couple years “old news” and well beyond the attention span of Dems.
Show us your PROOF with specific sources. We’re tired of unsubstantiated statements.
This is so sad. I read the DH online but my father and several that live near him do not have the internet or access to a computer and prefer to read the good ol’ paper! I feel like things are changing so quickly and the older generation can’t keep up. They aren’t used to all the electronics.
Another thing, I still love to read a good book, hold it in my hands, and use a bookmark when I’m done reading for the day! It will be a sad day when hard copy books no longer exist.
Can someone tell me what year the DH and the GT came under the same ownership? That was the beginning of the end…
Simple Google search indicates:
“Lee Enterprises bought the Gazette Times on October 1, 1969, and continues to operate it to the present day…The Democrat-Herald is currently owned by Lee Enterprises, which purchased the paper in 1997 from the Disney Corporation (which had purchased the paper from Capital Cities/ABC).”
I don’t imagine there are many out there who remember when the paper printed things like, marriage licenses and divorces, municipal court cases, and death notices and obituaries were printed at no charge. There were small town papers such as, I believe it was called the Halsey Review that had short articles about residents going on vacation.
I stopped the DH when a copy of the ALBANY paper had a half page article about a Corvallis Middle School and the other half on the Corvallis City Council.
Two things: I worked at the DH when Lee bought us and for multiple reasons was not happy about it … but in fairness Lee seemed like a pretty good owner for several years, maybe until the economy tanked in 2008. I plan to leave my plastic DH box, probably 20 years old, in place, at least for now. On my back deck I have a much older, metal (black with gold lettering) DH tube mounted for decoration. I also have a box for the Springfield News, another (now defunct) Lee paper.