Editor’s note: This is Rosemary Otzman’s final opinion column, “Extra Things I Know.” She retired June 30.
On Dec. 3, 1994, there was a double rainbow over Belleville Lake as about a dozen people gathered to create the Belleville-Area Independent newspaper. Each supporter put in $1,000 and we went out and bought the necessities to get it going.
A double rainbow
Designer Chesley Odom, who also saw the double-rainbow, created the design for our masthead. Over the past few years, we’ve been asked if the paper is gay because of the rainbow. I tell them we had the rainbow before gay got it.
At the beginning, I was the only one who knew how to make a newspaper, so I got to be editor and stayed the editor for more than 30 years until I got tired. I retired officially at the end of the day on Tuesday, June 30.
Over the years we published this local paper for the tri-community every Thursday without fail since our first edition on Jan. 5, 1995. It grew from 5,000 issues each week, to 7,000 where it has remained.
The paper carries local advertising, obituaries, local events, and reports on what our local municipalities, schools, and the district library are doing. Especially important are stories that affect your pocketbook.
In the early days, before social media, we had large papers with lots of room for stories on interesting people. We even had a travel writer who traveled all over the world and lived on E. Huron River Drive. We had a column on pets and another that was about a variety of subjects and was very charming.
I had written the “Extra Things I Know” column for almost ten years at the Richmond Review and then took a break when I worked as an editor at the Longmont Daily Times Call in Colorado. When we started the Independent, I resumed writing the column each week. After more than 30 more years of writing the weekly column, this is my final column.
This time, for good. I am really going home to sit on my couch and rest. I figure I’ve been a journalist for 70 years, starting as a fourth-grader when I created my first little newspaper. I got my sister to sell it for a penny apiece.
Good-bye. And, thank you for reading our local paper.
The new editor, Sarah Rigg, will introduce herself in next week’s edition. She is sure to do a great job.
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We want to thank everyone who has contacted me to wish me well on my retirement. I was celebrating my last-ever evening meeting in life as the three-hour VBT planning commission ended on June 24. Not to be. The city of Belleville set a special meeting on June 29 to approve the contract for the new city manager. So now, unless something else happens, my last evening meeting in life was Monday.
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Before the special city council meeting started on Monday, Mayor Pro-Tem Kelly Bates said she had received a letter for the council and nobody else had. So, they copied it off.
It was from a man who informed them he was going to start a new weekly paper in town. That surprised them, but I told them that at one time there were five weekly papers in Belleville and four of them were trying to put the Independent out of business. We survived.
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We were happy to see the comment about last week’s front-page story on our webpage from city manager finalist Darwin McClary, who was not selected as city manager. He graciously congratulated the winner, Brady Peck:
“Congratulations to Brady on the offer for this exciting position. I enjoyed the opportunity to meet and talk with staff during the meet-and-greet and the council during the interview. I wish the city all the best as it moves forward.”
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We see that Van Buren Township police officer Kurtis Mowbray was the winner of Saturday’s police donut-eating contest at Lake Fest.
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Sumpter Township Fire Chief Goode called Monday to say our information from a neighbor that we reported about the Willis Road fire was incorrect. He said it was a Sumpter fire and Sumpter got there six minutes after the call and eight minutes ahead of Huron Township. We stand corrected and apologize.