September 9, 2015, marked the end of an era for the Vermont newspaper business, as News & Citizen ran its 50-year-old printing press for the last time.

News & Citizen was the last small weekly community newspaper in Vermont to still be printing in house, and it had been doing so for 121 years. However, with the retirement of two pressmen in the same week, the Morrisville paper no longer had anyone to keep the press running.

As editor of Basement Medicine and general assignment reporter at News & Citizen, I’m glad I was there to witness the final run, and happier still that the News & Citizen and Transcript (published by the same staff) will continue in Lamoille County for years to come.

Although it only happened a month ago, many changes have occured since then. We began printing with Upper Valley Press in North Haverill, New Hampshire, and when Brad Limoge decided to retire as the third-generation in his family to own the Morrisville paper he sold the weekly, along with the Transcript, to the Stowe Reporter.

The Stowe paper did not buy Limoge’s commercial printing business or his building at 417 Brooklyn St. although the newspaper staff, including me, will continue to work out of that building for the time being, and they don’t plan on making any immediate changes.

All 10 of us working at the Morrisville paper were offered the opportunity to continue in our positions under the new management, at least until March 31, 2016, and hopefully we all will remain on staff after that 6-month period.

Last week, our staff met with the Stowe Reporter staff at their office for a pizza party, and to meet the rest of the news team, a few of whom I had met previously, while competing with them for stories.
Everything went very well, and I have a good feeling about this shift in management.

One major change is that we will no longer have to compete with Stowe to get a story out first and can work together to pitch ideas, so nobody is stepping on the other’s toes.

Another major change is that last week, the Transcript made its first appearance in color. News & Citizen will also be shifting to color on some, if not all, of its pages soon. There has also been talk of changing from a broadsheet to a tabloid format, which I think would be much easier to read.

So, after starting as an unpaid intern back in May, and being offered a full-time position in July, I can say that I have learned a lot in my journey to becomeing a reporter, and as things continue to change with the times, I know that I have much more to learn.

Maybe one day newspapers will be read only online. Or maybe there will be a shift back to the classic print media that I love. Either way, I don’t think they will ever go back to the black and white format I once held so dear to my heart.

There truly is nothing like collating, (putting all of the flyers into every paper), and ending up with hands covered in black ink.

I’m going to miss the whir of the printing presses always running in the back of the shop, and the smell of freshly published papers wafting through the office, but change is good, and I wish Brad a happy retirement.

-Kayla Friedrich, Editor-in-Chief