![\"Front](\"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/allin\/files\/2018\/06\/heraldamerican66.jpg\")
<\/a>Front page of the Syracuse Herald American, 1960s.<\/p><\/div>\n
Every day after school I’d pick up my pile of the Syracuse Herald-Journal, wrap the newspaper bag around the handlebars of my messenger bike and deliver through a wide swath of the village. Radio news existed only in short newscasts and the TV news didn’t air until evening. The internet was not even a gleam in Al Gore’s eye. That meant the paper on your doorstep was your first crack at what happened in the world and the neighborhood.<\/p>\n
Thursday before school I’d go in past the old Linotype machines (unused but too massive to be worth hauling away) to pick up the Potsdam weekly, the Courier-Freeman, and deliver it through the town before the homeroom bell rang.<\/p>\n
And on Sunday morning, I’d show up in the dark at the distributor’s ramshackle office on Beal St. to help unload the semi trailer with the Syracuse Herald-American, which we would then assemble, tucking in the local advertising inserts before delivering.<\/p>\n
It occurs to me that my first job was not a lot different from my current job, 50 years later. Still delivering the news. I don’t actually write the news, but I do deliver it to the many destinations that in the internet age pass for the doorstep: the front page of the website, the email newsletters, social media sites, etc. It’s a little easier on the back and knees, but it still has me up early every day, delivering the latest and the best out to a much enlarged delivery route.<\/p>\n