I was minding my own business this week when this email appeared:
“ I am hoping this gets to you since the phone number I had is no longer working and it seems you don’t have a Facebook page, either. Anyway, I want to tell you I am sincerely sorry for my behavior when I worked with you at The Union. It was unprofessional, and I am very sorry for any problems that I caused.”
It got me thinking about my experience at The Union newspaper.
Since I graduated from Northwestern University with a graduate degree in journalism (after my bachelor’s at UC Berkeley), I have only held four jobs: staff writer at the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel (covering airlines); staff writer and chief technology writer at the S.F. Chronicle covering big business (Chevron, Bechtel, etc.); editor at CNET (a startup that unraveled the “trade publications” and was eventually sold to CBS for $2 billion) and The Union.
Our family moved to Nevada City more than six years ago. We were in “semi-retirement” and wanted to find a place for my parents to wind down their lives. In addition, my wife’s sister lived here, another incentive.
–I never approached The Union for a job. Sally Harris, who then was the financial director at The Union, suggested I write “business stories” for them. Thanks, but I used to interview Bill Gates and Steve Jobs.
–Pat Butler, then the Managing Editor of The Union, contacted me about the city editor job. I interviewed, and determined it was going to be a “turnaround.” One of the senior reporters cautioned, referring to his boss: “Please don’t use the newspaper as a bully pulpit.” Meanwhile, Pat accepted another job as Editor of the Fairfield newspaper.
–So Jeff Ackerman offered me the job of Editor over lunch in Nevada City. He complained about how the reporters where not connected to the community and hoped that I could help. The pay was a hair north of $60K, about half of what I earned in the Bay Area.
–I accepted the job, because I figured it would be a good challenge. I never worried about the money, and I respected the pay scales in a tiny town.
–Then while we were down at the Del Mar horse races, Pat called me and asked if I’d be willing to work under him, because he was having second thoughts about the Fairfield job. I said “no,” I already was focused on going forward with the challenge at The Union. It was a weird discussion.
–Indeed The Union was a challenge. It was a dysfunctional organization, to be sure, at least at the time. Lots of infighting and self interest. Pat had fallen behind in his employee reviews, and my first job was to bring them up to date. What fun!
–One memorable experience was when Jeff and The Union’s bean counter asked me to consider dumping the the Associated Press wire service and RL Crabb’s cartoon. They wanted to save money. The poor AP manager drove up from S.F. to meet with me. It was humiliating for him — and me.
I took Crabb to lunch at “Lin Q” buffet (his choice). I recommended to Jeff and the bean counter to keep RL Crabb for that ricuculously low rate — and won that “battle.”
–Another downer was when “Nuke Brunswick” of The Mountain Messenger wrote a “hit piece” about me. I knew who planted the story. It was sad, because my point was a good one: Wondering whether a partisan political rally was being held without renting the space.
I complained to Jeff about he “hit piece,” but he said to ignore it. I trusted him, and I shouldn’t have.
–I thought Jeff was on my side to turn things around at this little community newspaper. But then he turned the table on me: Eliminating the Editor job one Saturday afternoon. Over the years, I had challenged his deference to the “Good Old Boys,” his longterm friends. But I think they deserved scrutiny too.
Jeff offered $40K in severance for eliminating the Editor’s job, but I passed because the “terms” of the document included not candidly discussing my experiences at the newspaper — good and bad. I still have the document.
–Now Jeff has been shipped off to Oregon (deservedly so, I believe), and he writes about the opportunity for “peeing off his porch” at a new home, because of the privacy. Honest. He wrote a column about it. You can’t make this stuff up.
–So here we are with a new publisher, a nicer fellow. On the other hand, he wants to copy my idea for FoodWineArt magazine and launch a monthly product titled “Food Wine Art.” Imitation is the sincerest for of flattery. He could at least say “Thank you.”
So that’s what it’s like to move your family from the “rat race” of the Bay Area and try to build a business here in a tiny town.
We are doing just fine, and we will continue to thrive. But let the buyer beware!
Filed under: Uncategorized
was that email from Jeff A, or is that something you wanted to keep to yourself?
A-Wholes seem to be endemic to humankind, be they rural or urban.
Too much information.
Sorry Michael. I know this topic makes you uncomfortable. Have a good week.
It doesn’t make me uncomfortable, Jeff. It makes me shake my head in wonder.
Personally, I enjoyed learning more. The Internet is a wall that can distort impressions due to skimpy info and no face to face communication. Our lives are what they have been; why should that be secretive.
Just my opinion.
Jeff,
Thanks for the insight. There is always way more than meets the eye. I agree with Ed. The more information is out there the more we can shape more accurate opinions on the issues. Also thank you for being able to differentiate between big cities and small towns, neither one is better. Both have there pluses and minuses.
Jeff, I have found that we both are cut from much of the same cloth as I too have had “issues” as when we both have worked in areas outside our little hamlet, there is a certain respect and professionalism that we expect and deserve.
These factors seems to be lacking here with a number of local companies, and people wonder why their best employees do not mind the 68 mile commute (one way) to the Sacramento Valley every day.
It’s very hard for people like the both of us to respect, or get used to little people who think the world revolves around them as these people seem to be non-creative thinkers who cannot live within specific guidelines of a professional industry such that you work in.
Because of this they get consistent turn over, and low grade employees as most of us have a finite amount of respect for this type of behavior.
Me too, Michael.
I think we’re shaking our heads in wonder at different things.
We are. And I’m shaking mine again too!
Well, it’s your blog and of course you can do whatever you want with it. I just happen to think that what happened during your tenure at The Union is yesterday’s lettuce.
Thanks Michael. I happen to think it’s highly relevant to the way our community can operate. Need I say you’ve “lived here too long”? My business is thriving; I trust yours is too. Whatever.
This is where we might part ways, Jeff. I’m still looking for a benchmark on this “lived here too long” thing. Eventually you will have lived here for multiple decades as well–will that mean you have lived here too long?
Or does “lived here too long” mean something else? As in, “you’re willing to tolerate baloney because you just want to get along after having been worn down by the provincialism”? Or some other projected vice?
Look, you and I grew up on the Peninsula in the 60s and 70s (you also had a stint down south), in towns that were just a few miles apart. I just happened to move here before you did by about 17 years (I know, you had some family land outside of Downieville, so technically you got here before me:-)
Anyway, one of the silliest exercises I see in this town [and when I say "town" I mean Nevada County] is this weird comparison of how long people have lived here and where they came from. Perhaps it’s a bizarre cultural carry-over from the gold rush days when nobody here was a native. Except, of course, the natives.
Which dovetails perfectly with the Nisenan Heritage Day that is happening this Saturday at the Miner’s Foundry. Everyone is talking about it, and the best background info. is here, as Jeff stated above: http://jeffpelline.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/nevadacountyhistoricalsociety-oct2012.pdf
It’s been a pleasing long week of natural heritage news…my oldest son showed up at my office 2 days ago with one of his friends, a leader with the Buffalo Field Campaign which “protects the only continuously wild, free roaming and genetically intact population of wild buffalo in the United States.” Their website is here: http://www.buffalofieldcampaign.org.
So yeah, I have to get a better read on what you mean, Jeff, on your “lived here too long” riff. Help me out.
Michael,
I think I’ve been clear about this in the past. You have grasped it well and state it with diplomacy: As in, “you’re willing to tolerate baloney because you just want to get along after having been worn down by the provincialism”? Or some other projected vice?
I think the issues extend well beyond provincialism, however. That whole “podunk” (urban vs. rural) counter-attack whenever I raise this issue oversimplifies and deflects it.
Some of the stuff is serious. It can range from scrutinizing local business issues (Citizens Bank, hard-money loans, our “Tea Party Gazette”) to political issues (the “Asleep at the Wheel” grand jury report about Nevada City, our Congressman who speaks out against the “left-wing clerk recorder,” or local voter “integrity” campaigns) and so on. The good news: We do seem to have an open dialogue about pot.
I also think a lot of people are afraid to speak out for fear of being ostracised or “black balled” in a small town. People also tend to mix too much friendship and socializing with the business of what is “right and wrong.”
There’s an old saying about “safety in numbers” to get a constructive dialogue going rather than sweep it under the rug or minimize it. And social media is FORCING US to change how we communicate, as Ed Peritz has stated.
It can lead to more “democracy in small towns,” as we have also discussed previously. http://sierrafoothillsreport.com/2011/10/23/democratization-in-small-towns-is-the-old-order-listening/
BTW, my uncle had a mining claim outside of Downieville in the ’60s. We visited for camping, fishing and panning for gold but never had any financial interest in the property. He was rough and tumble himself, to be sure, and he always described Nevada City that way too — mostly in an endearing way.
Michael,
Yesterday’s lettuce is tomorrows weeds.
And for many, it’s a meal.
Somewhere along the way our community lost sight of and appreciation for the accomplishments and entrepreneur spirit made famous by a local pioneer, Charles Litton. We are more comfy and competent at construction, real estate and more cyclical industries. It’s too bad we don’t work harder to celebrate our vast diversity and creating new things. We could light the region on fire. We are stuck in our recent past, from the ‘ 70s on.
Gung Ho. Working together. USMC. But petty b.s. always seems to destroy cooperation.
I’ll jump in again just to say I welcome openess. So many comments are cryptic leaving one not knowing what the hell is meant. Another blog owner commented that my “openness” was refreshing and very rare here. That’s a shame. I found that I must be frank and honest and not evasive when talking about myself and past, which, as I’ve posted, included lots of blood and combat, before Vietnam, after Nam, and one serious illness after another, two of which were ongoing while I was in college,but still had nearly a 4.0. And salvaging our VT. project after the President of the NYT magazine division and creator of Golf Digest, US magazines and my partner, with his high power, manipulating B.S. alienated the local Vermonters in 1980 and the project was about 650 thousand dollars in the hole. Almost in tears, he talked me into leaving my job, girl friend, town and going to live in the furnished model unit and try and straighten the mess out. I did, but by the time we parted, we were nose to nose, screaming at each other. He never understood, despite his other successes, that you don’t treat the local Vermonters like you do the NYC ad people. Don’t lie. The final straw was with some millionaire crook who I fought against but still we wasted $50,000 on the S.O.B.s idea he sold to my partner–father’s age, but I bought my father”s interest in the land).
Once I got the project out of debt, he could only say, “Nows the time to get greedy.” Getting the project out of debt meant me deciding to start a new building during the first week of Nov. in VT. Soon temps were below zero, but having gonads brings success, along with being sincere with the people you gather to do the work.
Mystery doesn’t help social relationships or business, IMO. I’m for saying what you mean so the other person doesn’t have to guess about what it was you did mean. There is a lot of that on this blog.
I’d be doing a lot more writing, but just get to wasted early and it’s back to bed. No sympathy is wanted; that’s life. So I tell it like it is or was. Evasion just leads to extraneous retellings.
The right wing is certainly free to speak, but others are free to call them out when being cagey or just plain dishonest. One’s word is his most precious jewel of speech, but that seems trite these days.
Having been raised in a 15 room house with a castle across the street, I know the possiblities of GOP ideals, but those ideals have morphed into a pool of sludge and slime and so many freely bath in it. Just today, from TX, I rec’d a ugly email of Obama, looking like Alfalfa after seeing a ghost. But I lived with his family and know he, and his oldest brother, once my closest friend, all 350 lbs on a 6’3″ frame, would always speak their minds; no guess work involved. We argued about everything, but when he died at age 50, of a heart attack on his wedding anniversary day, I never cried so much in my life.
There’s much to be said for direct talk; all this cryptic stuff just makes peoples heads spin. I’ve asked people what they meant at times, but usually don’t get an answer. That seems the way of Internet conversations at best; at worst just visit the Dragons sesspool or read the random comments of “the people” following some writers op-ed.
Personally, I enjoy people’s stories, but then I’ve been a history freak since before I was ten.
Friendly reminder to readers: Please keep the commentary civil. Thanks!
http://testkitchen.colorado.edu/projects/current-projects/civil-comments-for-news-websites/
I apologize.
Ed,
Didn’t mean you,
Thanks for the heads up. Didn’t think I blazed a new verbiage trail, so was perplexed. Still, with a patch sewn on a jean shirt saying, “This vet is medicated for your protection,” and knowing thar be some truth in that golden nugget, I took responsibility. And have been very uncivil on another blog, so I know the dark side within that can pop its head up and spit like a cobra.
Was it me and the lettuce comment? Color me also perplexed, Ed.
No. This person knows who he is. Sort of like confessional in church.
Copy.
Ed, you are very civil. The Union killed commenting before the 2010 elections. Bet it opens up again, just AFTER the Nov 6th elections.
Granted, The Union does lean right. However, personally, I have written several “Other Voices” columns that have been highly critical of conservative ideals and politicians and the paper seems to publish almost every submission l have sent them for the last couple of years, at least. They are better than they were when I moved here 37 years ago.