Saying goodbye to all ya’ll

After two-and-a half-years it's a bittersweet goodbye. 
First to my staff-my editor, Karen Jorgensen (the Great Dane); Jami Morris, our newest and most humorous staff member; Tricia, my wife has been the ramrod of this outfit; part-timers, Pat Garry, our sports guy; Renee Berg, our contributing writer who is a highly skilled newsy; and Wayne Hendrickson, Our Neighbor author and storyteller; Ron Albright (columnist); and Emily Steffens (columnist). Jodi Larson has been our accounting person on contract with Carolyn’s Business Services.
I cannot continue without mentioning all of the people who volunteer to be our eyes in the communities the DCI serves.
Photographers, Tami Kennedy, Angie Richards, John Huzuka, Nathan Smith, Heather Vanderpool, Mary Nelson, Julianne Fox, Brooke Distad and Dawn Hallstrom. These volunteers made the pages of the DCI pop, capturing our young athletes in print.
Print. That’s becoming obsolete to some due to their fixation on the Internet.
For the most part folks think they can find everything on Facebook, Twitter or another platform in the social media corral.
Well, picking up a DCI or subscribing to it will certainly provide young and old alike with a non-invasive media. We do not peddle smut, half-truths or porn. We are a family-friendly form of information.
Most of our joint efforts have gone unnoticed by most. However, I know many people have reminded me that the DCI has not been the same since Randy Carlson sold it to Rick Bussler. They’re right. Randy and his father, Folmer before him, made a huge impression on Dodge County and Byron.
Living in that enormous shadow has been challenging.
It has been one of the most challenging situations
I have encountered in 47 years of publishing community newspapers. Not even daily newspapers were as difficult to overcome the ghost of the past at the DCI.
This is my final column on page four of the DCI. It is my hope that this newspaper will continue long after I’m a faint memory.
ALWAYS RIGHT
“Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day-by-day and minute-by-minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.”
— George Orwell, 1984