I had cause yesterday to check out some old saved newspapers, looking for articles I wrote about the inaugural World Youth Softball Championships back in the early 1980s. The papers, while yellowing, were well-preserved. Maybe it was the paper, yellowing and all.
Leafing through the pages, I was struck by the full broadsheet size and thickness of each page. The pages almost felt like cardboard, compared to what I hold in my hands these days. The ink was black as starless night and didn't come off on my hands. But, that's a function of time, since ink back then, when fresh, was MORE likely to escape onto your fingers then today's duller, vegetable-based inks. On the other hand, I LIKED being an ink-stained wretch at the time.
The broadsheet has significantly shrunk these days. Holding out a broadsheet paper back in those days was like hugging a pickle barrel. You HAD to fold it so that you could only see one page at a time. And it wasn't unusual to see that one page folded vertically in half again, to handle better and to read down the length of the tall page.
This handling feature gave birth to the tabs which were roughly two-thirds of a broadsheet wide and about as tall as the broadsheet was wide. In Toronto, the Sun was always a tab, while the Star and the Globe and Mail were broadsheets (at least during my lifetime). When other papers joined the fray, they all came in as broadsheets, Toronto is the best-served newspaper town in North America, save for New York City.
Locally, the Guardian and the Brampton Daily Times were both broadsheets, until the Daily Times folded. About the same time, the Guardian became a tab. I'd worked for all four papers just mentioned, although only as a columnist for the Times.
I much preferred the broadsheet paper, and it's one of the reasons I've been a regular subscriber and reader of the Star all these years. I read the Sun, look over the Globe and Mail and occasionally the National Post, but I'm a Star guy. And that's the only paper that every FIRED me, so you know the loyalty runs deep.
Nobody in the paper business has any optimism about the long-term viability of the newspaper. The internet has bit big into the advertising business that fuels the newspaper model. In fact, advertising usually PAYS for the newspaper you read. The price you paid at the stand or into the hands of a carrier, is the PROFIT for the newspaper. I once wrote an essay in high school calling the newspaper the best bargain for 25 cents you can find (yes, I AM that OLD). Even at the current price, the statement still stands.
But I wish I wasn't making so many excuses for the newspapers. Let's start with the ink. Yes, it doesn't come off, but it's still too dim and it doesn't have that SMELL. I miss that smell. Secondly, the newspaper broadsheet is barely bigger than the tab of twenty years ago. There's less there, now. And so has the amount of words gone with it. I look for a newspaper to be MORE than a web-site paragraph. It doesn't have to go to Time magazine lengths, but there should be more analysis, more reporting.
And finally, we get to the paper. On a sunny day, I used to be able to open up a newspaper and read it, while sitting in my comfy green chair facing the front window. Now, not so much. I have to fold it back onto the back of the rest of the section. That's because the paper is so thin, ANY light source is enough to pass right on through and destroy the reading experience. And the paper's ability to withstand the rough handling of printing presses is a thing of the past. Creases and double-backs happen all the time. I am constantly pulling the page apart like an accordion, to see the words, rather than guessing at them. And waaaaaay too often, the paper didn't get through the press perfectly centred, resulting in chopped off text on one side or the other.
Still, my day always starts the same. I go to the computer, click a half-dozen times in Firefox to load the 70 or so sites I visit regularly. Then, it's downstairs to get the newspaper out of the door (You CAN train the carrier to put it inside the door, if you harp enough and cancel the subscription when they do it twice in a row). I glance at the front page, without being interested enough to check inside it if nothing catches my eye. I put the front section onto the discarded newspaper stack in the kitchen and then take what sections I regularly read upstairs to the reading room. On weekdays, the chosen sections are almost always the full rest of the paper. About half the sections make the journey on Saturdays and the whole paper, front section and all, gets read on Sundays.
I can't envision a different way to starting the day. I hope I never have to.
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