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OPINION: In Lieu of an Obituary for Alaska Newspapers

August 14th 2:09 am | J. Pennelope Goforth Print this article   Email this article   Create a Shortlink for this article

Reading about the 'liquidation' of Alaska Newspapers Inc. makes me feel like I did in the wheelhouse of a fishing boat out on the storming Bering Sea when we heard over the single side band of another boat going down; shocked and grief-stricken. The demise of the rural Alaskan newspapers hits me kind of hard.

I started The Aleutian Eagle out of Unalaska during the Dutch Harbor fishing boom of the early 1980s. Later I was summer relief skipper on the Bistol BayTimes when publisher Fritz Johnson headed out for salmon season. Rosie Porter of the Tundra Drums, Nancy McGuire up at the Nome Nugget and Nancy Freeman at the Kodiak Daily Mirror were the stalwart vets of local journalism in Western Alaska. We supported each other and avidly read each other's papers. We had all been inspired by Howard Rock's magnificent course with the Tundra Times at the helm of Native rights issues.

Publishing a newspaper in rural Alaska never was easy. Like my peers, to make ends meet, I drove cab, traded photographs for dental work for my kids, and went fishing. Usually I went out to earn real money as soon as we put the paper on the propjet out of Dutch Harbor bound for printing in Anchorage. Sometimes it was a race to the plane after all-night editing and last minute layouts, waved onto the tarmac by Reeve Aleutian Airway's Dutch Harbor station manager, to hand the box through the open cockpit window to the waiting pilot.

Weather permitting, a few days later I'd get a shout on the VHF that the plane had made it out of Cold Bay and the ETA for Dutch. The bundles of printed editions were the first cargo to be tossed off the plane into a running cab for immediate delivery to Carl's Commercial, the Elbow Room, Abi's Place, and the Unisea Inn. In the Unisea, the only time you could hear yourself talk over the din of smacking billiards, drunk fishermen, and the drink calls of harried cocktail waitresses was right after the Eagle landed; everyone sat with a drink at their elbow and the paper spread out on the bar. The kids at Carl's grabbed it to see the pictures of basketball games or the school events we covered.

It takes a whole village to produce a local newspaper and I don't mean just the content. My first editorial office was at the far end of the bar in the Elbow Room at the stool next to the wall phone courtesy of owner, Billy Shaishnikoff. Every patron nursing a drink at the bar had a hot news tip for me or a classified ad. One of the regulars, Tiny Shasteen, served without pay-but with a certain amount of prestige-as the Eagle's official secretary. He kept track of my whereabouts On The Other Side, took down messages, and told me what leads were worth chasing down. It was Tiny who told me the RAINBOW WARRIOR was off Priest Rock coming in for fuel reputedly on their way to disrupt the seal harvest on St Paul. Hearing that, I grabbed the city's TV cameraman John Lincoln and off we went in a Zodiak from a SeaAlaska fishing boat interview the Greenpeace captain. I often climbed the Jacob's ladder right behind the pilot to a newsworthy vessel entering Dutch from the bobbing deck of the yellow harbor tug PADILLA at the invite of the skipper.

Of course, we couldn't pay our reporters much. We didn't do it for the money. Everyone had a 'real' job on the side. I guess we did it for the more intangible but satisfying benefit of serving our communities. I did it because years ago as a young journalist slinging a load of cameras and stringing stories for Associated Press, Alaska Fisherman's Journal and the Fisherman's News, Alvin Bereskin, of Unalaska, said to me, "You write stories for them fishermen Outside, what about writing for us?"

I'd come to love the people of the Aleutians, their kindness, humor, and perseverance despite centuries-long tides of racism and economic imperialism. From the beginning, The Aleutian Eagle served all the residents as my reporting expanded from the North Pacific and Bering Sea fisheries to local stories of Aleut history, Russian Orthodox events like starring; WWII veterans tales, and the weddings, births and funerals of the villages of Akutan, Sand Point, King Cove, the Pribiloffs and any where else we could get news to publish that people wanted to read.

Fritz, the Nancys, Rosie, and me, we did it as long as we could. I always thought it would keep getting done. Others would pick up the pen, aim the camera, and keep us all informed on the doings in our villages. Newspapers have always served as the foundation of a democratic people, giving everyone a voice on all sides of local issues. From the most humble of city council proposed ordinances to the recognition of outstanding teachers to the exposure of a corrupt city official, the newspapers kept us informed about ourselves and our world.

I applauded Calista years ago when they bought up the small papers we could barely keep publishing. The Aleutian Eagle crashed and just about burned up under the crazy Lindauer's who took it over. Local loyalists revived it as the Dutch Harbor Fisherman. When the publisher's wife demanded he support his family, the popular section Unalaska Police Blotter was nearly lost again. (The blotter started out under Mark Munro's acerbic tongue-in-cheek reportage for the Eagle. Now even the cops have adopted his writing style.) Gradually Calista saved them all and wisely retained their mastheads. Rosie had to move down south for her health (most editors have high blood pressure). Fritz needed to support his family on more than top ramen and dried salmon and went to work for the local Native corporation. I went on to become an editor for the state's Department of Labor monthly publication Alaska Economic Trends.

I am disappointed that despite record-breaking dividend payouts Calista has decided to cease their news service to the local communities. I guess they, like us, did it as long as they could. (Still, what happened to the accounting trick of writing off the unprofitable against the very profitable corporate bottom line??)

Yeah, yeah I know newspapers everywhere are sinking faster than crab boats in February. Long gone are the days of the village grapevine, the once ubiquitous CB, and later VHF, radios. Now thereÕs the Internet, a tsunami of information. RATNET gave way to the wastelands of channels on DishTV.

Still I'm distressed that the voice of coastal Alaskans will no longer be read in a local newspaper format.. That Alvin's simple request will now go unheeded. Especially in an age when many of my peers succumbed to alcoholism, when the children of my friends turn more and more to suicide, when the commercial opportunities of the opening of the Arctic seas beckon. When we need as a people to feel our lives validated and our deeds acknowledged.

Not that there isn't communication. My daughter and her classmates of Unalaska High School share their lives on Facebook. And there is Alaska News Nightly on the radio. And the Anchorage Daily News reports some local news. But nothing come close to filling the place and the importance of a community newspaper.

As far as this veteran Alaskan reporter and former newspaper publisher is concerned only a local newspaper can fill the profound need for a caring yet professional witness to our local voices, our regional news, for our Bush Alaska slant on life. And for our necessary sense and pride of place in the community, in Alaska, and in each other. I grieve for this passing.

(signed) J. Pennelope Goforth,

former editor The Aleutian Eagle

©2011 J. P. Goforth

 


Copyright 2012 The Dutch Harbor Fisherman is a publication of Alaska Newspapers, Inc. This article is © 2012 and limited reproduction rights for personal use are granted for this printing only. This article, in any form, may not be further reproduced without written permission of the publisher and owner, including duplication for not-for-profit purposes. Portions of this article may belong to other agencies; those sections are reproduced here with permission and Alaska Newspapers, Inc. makes no provisions for further distribution.