My journalism journey part 22

So many of my memories of South Dakota and Aberdeen were from the people I met, both at the paper and the people I interviewed. First, as with most newspapers, the staff was like a family. And for a single woman like me, that was important. From the beginning, those in the newsroom were my family.
The first Thanksgiving there, our managing editor, Heidi Reuter, invited all the singles over for dinner. Other holidays, I spent with Wally and Margie Mundstock down in Redfield, where they had bought a newspaper. It was good to have my Montana family nearby, too.
This was the first morning newspaper at which I worked, and it suited me just fine. I was a night owl anyway, so getting into work at 3 or 4 p.m. was just the right time. Often after work, a bunch of us would go out for beer or a bite to eat. Patanna Zimmerman, Whitey Didreckson from the back shop, Gail O'Neill, photographer Dick Carlson ... we'd go out to a restaurant for a late breakfast after the paper was out, or close out the bar. The camaraderie was much like it was on my first paper.
The sports staff was a good bunch, too. Sports Editor Ron Feickert had lived in Aberdeen all his life and knew just about everything about the city. As a young boy, he worked the manual scoreboard at the Aberdeen Pheasants ballpark and remembered when Baltimore Oriole great Cal Ripken Jr. was a kid running around the park as his dad managed the Orioles farm team.
Feickert was a heavy smoker, and you could smell him coming back from the smoking dock, the smoke lingering long after on him. When the company decided no smoking would be allowed on company grounds, he gave up the habit. And it was a big difference. I was happy he did because I like Ron a lot. I wouldn't wish cancer or heart disease on anyone. Unfortunately, Ron died recently of lung cancer.
I learned a lot about editing from Ron. Before I worked in Aberdeen, I had only edited my own copy and while in Illinois, one other person. So this was the first time anyone had edited my copy. Sometimes we didn't always agree on things he cut and sometimes we could butt heads on things, but for the most part, we got along. I remember after I took my writing test for my job interview, Ron told me I had written the two stories he gave me better than what they had in the paper.
There was Matt Schmidt, our other sports writer, and Dave Vilhauer, who eventually became a full-time writer. He had worked for a long time at the American News while he was going to college before he became full time. After all the years at the newspaper, he recently moved over to radio. Hard to think of Dave not being at the American News.
Our group of part-timers was a mixed bag. Most were either high school or college kids who had an interest in sports or wanted to be sports writers. Some had some ability; some were goofballs. Then there was Scott Waltman.
While he was in high school, Waltman was one of the "goofball" bunch. He was one of those who loved to recycle the SportsCenter catchphrases and seemed to get things wrong. But when he went away to college and we needed a sports intern one year, we brought him in, and he was a different guy. Suddenly, Waltman had grown up.
I remember one evening he came in and was upset he had made a mistake in that day's paper. OK, I told him, write a correction and we'll take care of it. He had never been so distraught about other miscues. But now was different. Now he was different. I told him mistakes were going to happen. We just had to do the best we could to prevent them. But even so, occasionally, some errors still slipped through. And then, you wrote the correction, learned from it and moved forward.
Scott did pretty well as our sports intern that fall. So much so he is now the managing editor of the American News. I think he has done very well for himself.
The newsroom was a close group, so the sports and news folks mingled enough, unlike some other papers. I remember well Russ Keen, a chain-smoking news reporter who sat near me for years. He was a sweet guy who wouldn't hurt a fly. A few years ago, he was killed in an auto accident.
I enjoyed my eight years in Aberdeen, mostly because of the people I worked with and those I met, and the stories I covered. We used to joke the crime rate in Aberdeen was so low because it was too cold in the winter to commit crimes - everyone stayed inside. But it was also because everyone knew you, too. People took the time to come up and say hi in stores (sometimes that was good, sometimes not so good) and they also looked out for you. It was the way of the small town.