To the Omaha World Herald

Recently we got word that after Feb. 1 the Omaha World Herald would no longer be delivered to us in McCook -- or anywhere in Southwest Nebraska. I realize that newspapers, like any other business must make changes, but this news was very disheartening to me and my family. Don't get me wrong, I love the McCook Daily Gazette. It is an essential part in our keeping abreast of things in McCook and our region, but the Omaha World Herald, together with my cup of coffee, has been a morning ritual for more years than I care to remember.

Actually, the World Herald and I have been together for virtually my entire life. In the third grade, Miss Weingartner (our teacher at Plainview Grade School) brought the World Herald to school to teach us about the various sections that made up the newspaper, and introduced us to the comic section.

Each day she would read to us the latest antics of Skeezix and Uncle Walt, the adventures of Little Orphan Annie, and Dick Tracy. She told us that she wanted us to get interested in reading something in the paper, and as we grew older we'd find more and more things in the paper that interested us, and we'd know what was going on in our world. I think that it worked out that way for a lot of us.

The family of one of my friends in Plainview took the Omaha Bee News. He was very proud of that paper, and we argued extensively over the merits of the World Herald and the Bee News (comics mostly) until the Bee was eventually absorbed by the World Herald in 1937.

Later I discovered the sports page in the World Herald, and ever since I can hardly wait to see how my favorites on the Husker team performed in Saturday's game. In former times, the Sunday paper contained several pages of action shots from the game. Those games always began at 1:30 on Saturday afternoons and we got the full report on Sunday, even in Outstate Nebraska.

I always (well almost always) enjoy Tom Shatel's column, and get a kick out of the slant he takes on a wide variety of sports related issues. But the World Herald has been blessed with a succession of good sports editors and reporters.

Robert Phipps wrote about baseball, and was a relative of my classmate, Marvin Phipps (or so he claimed) -- but true or not, that made him a great favorite of all the boys in my grade. He became a hero to us when he was singled out by Richard Tregaskis in his World War II classic book, "Guadalcanal Diary."

Fritz Ware, World Herald Sports Editor in the '20s and '30s had a knack for turning a phrase, and was widely quoted, nationwide, for his clever and vivid word pictures of the games. Of course he was too good, and eventually was moved up to be editor of the whole paper.

Wally Provost was a great sports editor. He was a tender hearted fellow, and he loved the games. He was a sympathetic observer, and his human interest stories of the athletes made great reading, even if one didn't particularly care for the sports and games.

Greg McBride was the fellow who raised coverage of high school sports to a higher level with his ratings of the top 10 schools in each of the classes, and with his choices for the All-State teams. He thrived on the controversy he created with his picks, and was conspicuous by his presence at outstate games. In the late '50s, soon after we arrived in McCook, Greg McBride covered an important game at McCook's Weiland Field. McCook had been rated very high, and for no apparent reason (to McCookites) had been dropped down several notches just prior to McBride's trip here.

When he stopped at the school to interview the coach he was greeted by a farm fertilizer spreader on the school lawn -- the large sign on the machine read, "Greg McBride's Typewriter." McBride loved it, and took a picture, which later appeared in the World Herald's sports section.

For many years, Tom Allen served as the World Herald's Goodwill Ambassador to Nebraska. He covered the state, from Rulo to Carhenge, and from Macy to McCook. He seemed to know everyone, and was welcomed wherever he went. He delighted his readers with great human interest stories about the people he met. He must have had license to travel where and when he pleased, because he was apt to show up in any part of the state at any time. I think he was largely responsible for making the World Herald Nebraska's premier paper, and even softening a bit the rift between Eastern Nebraska and the rest of the state.

Whatever his schedule, though, on game day Saturday afternoons Tom was always in Lincoln for the Husker football games. His reports came from the opponents' locker room, and somehow he always managed to make the opponents seem civilized, and articulate.

No matter how hard- fought the game, he brought perspective to the scene -- after all, it was just a game, and those fellows playing the game, on both sides, were really regular guys, who under other circumstances would be kindred spirits.

For years the Sunday World Herald carried Hollis Limbrect's wonderful, locally produced magazine section, which highlighted places and people of Nebraska. That magazine had a resident poet, Victor Hass, who also reviewed books -- so well that one was often tempted to go right out and buy the book he had reviewed.

Another columnist in the Sunday magazine was Guy Williams, who wrote a whimsical column about whatever tickled his fancy -- the things he liked "More than somewhat" (his favorite expression). For several weeks in 1947, Chris Buethe (Cactus Chris of more recent days) and I were the butt of his sometimes stinging wit. He had written a piece on traveling by raft on a river. Chris and I wrote to him, telling about our proposed trip down the Missouri River, ala Tom Sawyer. He took that right up and addressed it in several columns. I learned just how many people read that column.

A number of people (too many) reported grave consequences of such a trip to our folks. It was enough that our folks eventually vetoed our trip and we had to change our mode of transportation to St. Louis -- to a hitch hiking trip (which at that time was deemed safer).

In our later years, my wife, Jean, and I have traveled extensively throughout the U.S. We always need to read a morning paper at the breakfast table, and it has been interesting to see how papers vary from place to place, from the ubiquitous USA Today, to the locals, in cities and hamlets across the country. I'm sure that if we were ever in one place for any length of time we'd find a paper we liked, but we've learned that one of the things we really appreciate when we get back home is our beloved World Herald, to tell us what is going on in the world, our nation and Nebraska.

So now, old friend, I guess it's time to say goodbye. It's been great. Good luck to you. We're going to miss you -- "more than somewhat"!