Photo of me with whiskers

When I went skiing in Colorado a month ago I decided to grow some facial hair. I did it once before after I did Chemotherapy because I was so happy just to have hair. I've had it for a few weeks, but it's gone now. I'm just not cut out to have facial hair. Anyway I thought you might like to see it.

Here is a column I wrote about the Newspaper business

Bruce Column March 29, 2009

These are difficult times for newspapers. Within the past month at least two large metropolitan newspapers in the western United States have gone out of business, the Rocky Mountain News in Denver and the Seattle Post Intelligencer. I was in Colorado the day the Rocky Mountain News printed their last edition and watched with sadness as a television newscast chronicled the removal of the huge Rocky Mountain News sign from their Denver office building. It appears competing newspapers in large metropolitan areas are becoming a thing of the past. There simply isn’t enough revenue to support two newspapers in the big cities.
The newspapers in most cities big and small have a long tradition of serving their communities and most of them can trace their roots back to the mid to late 1800’s. Many of the big metro dailies can trace their roots back to the 1700’s and the early history of the country. Newspapers played a significant role in the founding of our country. The history of The Herald Journal goes back to 1879 when a little weekly newspaper called The Leader was born. The Leader eventually became the Utah Journal and then The Logan Journal. The Cache Valley Herald was born in 1925 as a competitor to the Logan Journal. The competition between the two newspapers was spirited and it soon became obvious that two newspapers couldn’t survive in Cache Valley. The two newspapers ended their competition with one another in 1931 when they combined into The Herald Journal and went from weekly to daily publication.
Since that time The Herald Journal has continued to change as the needs of Cache Valley have changed. Adding a Saturday edition, switching to morning delivery, and creating an Internet site, hjnews.com, are just three of the most significant recent changes that have helped The Herald Journal remain the dominant supplier of information to the people of Cache Valley.
The relatively recent development of the Internet as a source of information has had a huge impact on the way we do our business and will probably influence how we operate for years to come. When we began our website, hjnews.com, almost fifteen years ago we had no idea where it would end up. Since that time we have gradually shifted some resources from the newspaper to our Internet effort. One of the early dilemma’s we faced was whether or not we should make the entire Herald Journal available for free on the Internet. The choice we made, right or wrong, was to have both a free site and a paid site. The paid site offers the entire Herald Journal on line and looks just like the printed edition. Subscribers to the print edition have free access to the complete on-line edition. Those who don’t subscribe to the printed version can subscribe to the on line version. The free site, hjnews.com, doesn’t include the entire news report found in The Herald Journal. It doesn’t even look like a newspaper. It includes only a few local stories along with breaking news, photo galleries, blogs, videos, national and international news and videos by the associated press, a place where readers can comment on the news of the day, and of course advertising.
Because hjnews.com has been around for almost fifteen years in has become one of the most popular places people go to get credible information about Logan, Cache Valley, the nation, and the world. Between the newspaper with a paid circulation of 16,500 each weekday and almost 18,000 on Sunday and a website that attracts more than 6,000 visitors each day we are reaching more people than we ever did with just the print product. For this reason we remain an excellent choice for advertisers to reach all of their potential customers.
I’m often asked how the newspaper is doing in light of the recent economic downturn and the emergence of the Internet as a free source of news and information. My answer is that like most businesses we have to make adjustments and change as the media business changes. So, yes the newspaper business is changing. Right now we are in what has been called “The Perfect Storm.” We are being affected by two significant forces at the same time, the economic recession and the Internet. Fortunately over the years we have been willing to take advantage of new technology and have continued to position ourselves with the newspaper and our Internet efforts as the primary source of local information in Cache Valley. When the “Perfect Storm” subsides we are confident that both the newspaper and our Internet site will thrive.
When I graduated from college in 1963 and made it know to my parents that newspapers was going to be my life long work I’ll never forget my mom’s comment about my choice. She Said, “I guess there will always be a newspaper.” Moms are always right. We’ll make it through this “Perfect Storm” and will always be there to inform and entertain. Like many other businesses some newspapers are being forced to close their doors. Right now it’s a difficult time for everyone, but I’m convinced that there will always be a newspaper.
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My HJ Column about what my dad had to say about the economy

Bruce column April 13, 2009

Growing up as the son of a father who had vivid memories of the great depression of the 1930’s and being very aware of the current world wide economic recession, I reflect often on conversations I had with my dad about money, the importance of being frugal and avoiding debt. Dad died in 1999 and at that time things were pretty good. The country wasn’t involved in a foreign war and the economy was relatively stable. Credit was readily available, people were buying cars and houses, everyone who wanted to work had a job, banks were not failing, and big national corporations were not looking to the government to bail them out of their financial problems. Life was good.
Dad always told my brothers and me as we were growing up that he couldn’t understand how the price of things could keep going up. If prices kept gong up people could no longer afford to buy the necessities of live let alone a few of the luxuries. I would always argue that it’s all relative. Yes, things cost more and the prices continue to rise, but people also make more money and will continue to make more money so they can afford the higher prices.
I can remember as a youngster discovering that my dad’s income working for the railroad was $10,000 per year. I thought that if I could ever get a job that paid $10,000 per year I would have it made. I also remember dad telling that his first and only house cost around $7,000. The payments were less than $20 per month it was a real struggle to make the payments and he thought he would never get it paid for.
He found it hard to believe that in 1966 I paid $16,000 for my first home in Missoula Montana. He found it harder to believe that I paid $35,000 for a home when I moved back to Idaho. He was flabbergasted when he found out that I paid $90,000 for a home in 1985 when I took a job at the newspaper in Bozeman. I didn’t dare tell him what I paid for my home in North Logan when we moved here in 1993. I know he would not have approved, it was simply too much money and I would never get it paid for.
As dad grew older he continued to be obsessed with the fact that things cost so much and continually warned us that the good times couldn’t last forever and we were headed for another depression. He strongly admonished his kids to avoid debt like the plague. Going into debt for a modest house was OK, and maybe even for a car, but that was it. He advised us to be frugal in the way we lived and spend our money. He sincerely believed that we should fix it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.
Dad was right when he said that someday there would be a huge economic correction. Prices and wages simply couldn’t continue to escalate as they had done for most of his adult life. The present economic correction is nothing like the great depression of the 30’s but it is the most drastic economic correction of my lifetime and is a cause for concern. Some families find themselves in houses that have decreased significantly in value and have discovered that they are upside down which means what they owe on the house is more than the house is worth. Many find that they have more credit card debt than they can afford and are paying huge amounts of interest to the credit card companies. Some people have gone into debt for expensive toys such as snowmobiles, motorcycles, boats, furniture and find themselves with huge payments they have a tough time making. Those who are a bit older, like me, have found that what they have been putting away for retirement has significantly decreased in value because of the huge drop in the value of stocks and mutual funds. Almost everyone has felt the effects of the economic downturn.
For what it’s worth I am confident about the future. In fact I think there are signs that we have reached the bottom of the recession and will soon begin to crawl out of the economic problems we have experienced over the past six to nine months. Some of headlines in last Friday’s paper gave me hope that the country has reached the bottom. Wells Fargo Bank nationally predicted record earnings, unemployment benefit filings nationwide have dropped, several large national retailers are predicting solid sales for April, and the stock market closed over 8,000 last Thursday after being down below 7,000 just a few months ago. All of the above in my view is good news and gives hope that things are beginning to turn around.
Also for what’s its worth it is my opinion that we in Cache Valley have been somewhat isolated from the serious economic problems that many parts of the country have felt. We simply haven’t suffered as many severe economic hardships as the rest of the country. The unemployment rate is higher than we would like but not as high as the rest of the country. Retail sales have suffered, but not as much as the rest of the country. Houses have decreased in value, but not decreased as much as the rest of the country.
Historically the economy has up and down cycles and there is no doubt that we are in a down cycle right now. But, the economy will recover over time, it always has. So when the recession is over what is the take home lesson that we should have learned to prepare for the next down cycle that is inevitable? My dad gave his sons good advice. Avoid debt like the plague, live modestly, save a little bit each payday, don’t be wasteful, and if possible fix it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.