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Happy 125th Roswell Daily Record

2 Sunday, March 6, 2016

125

History begins here

By Tom McDonald Roswell Daily Record

Newspapers, it has been said, write the “first draft of history.” Today’s edition is tomorrow’s archive. That’s certainly true in Roswell, where The Record has been exactly that — a record of local, state, national and international news, etched into print daily for 125 years now.

One hundred twenty five years of bringing you today’s news and tomorrow’s history, delivered to your doorstep, from our family to yours.

The Roswell Record began as a weekly on March 6, 1891, then grew into an daily a dozen years later. In 1984, the Daily Record went to a morning delivery and has been an integral part of Roswell mornings ever since.

This commemorative special section is a tribute to those 125 years. In it, you’ll find a little about the RDR of today and a whole lot of the Record from years past. Space does not allow us to run Elvis Fleming’s full history of the Roswell Daily Record — besides, we did that already, in our 100th commemorative issue — so we’ve pulled insightful excerpts instead, to capture the highs and lows of this longstanding newspaper.

We’ve added historical photos, photocopies of old front pages and a written relic or two to provide you with a long look back on what makes Roswell and the Daily Record what it is today.

Plus, we’ve reviewed our “family connections” through the years, focusing on the Shearman-Beck family ownership that has lasted nearly 80 years and continues to this day.

We also gave a little extra attention to our famous UFO edition of July 8, 1947. It’s part of our past that we’ve come to have a lot of fun with — and something that one of the “next Becks” —

Barbara Beck From The Publisher

Proud of newspaper’s tradition

HSSNM Museum Archives Center photo

Four unidentified men stand outside the original adobe home of the Record in this photo taken around June 20, 1894. The address is unknown as addresses were seldom used in the early days, but historians believe it was on Main Street.

Sarah, Barb’s daughter who to moved to Roswell with her — had a little extra fun with.

Watch for her RDR-alien cartoon in this section.

Longtime RDR readers will also recognize a warm and friendly “voice” from the past: Jerry McCormack, a newsroom staffer for more than three decades, including a dozen years as editor. He penned an excellent column both in reflection and as a look ahead.

Altogether, this 125th anniversary edition tells the story of a newspaper that went from an old adobe building somewhere downtown to a permanent state-of-the-art facility at 2301 N. Main. It’s here where we continue to do what we’ve been doing for years — covering Roswell news like no one else does.

Roswell history is now being drafted.

Bill Moffitt Photo

Today’s building at 2301 N. Main St. The RDR has been at this location since 1971.

The Record and its leadership over the years

It’s common knowledge, at least among students of history, that a lot of newspapers used to be unabashedly partisan. They were explicitly used to advance one political party agenda over another.

One consequence was that towns often had more than one newspaper, each representing a particular “voice” in politics. Roswell’s had its share of newspapers over the years — dozens by one estimate — and some with overlapping ownership interests.

So much of the political bend of a newspaper depends on its owner, or publisher, and its editor — and the Record Daily Record is no exception.

At various points in its history, it’s been affiliated with the Republican Party, including the years in which it was the more liberal and inclusive of the political parties, and the Democratic Party when it was the conservative alternative. But time and again, the newspaper has declared itself an inde-

Roswell Daily Record

Tom

McDonald Editor’s Notes pendent publication, as it is now.

One of my favorite stories, found within Elvis Fleming’s narrative on the history of the Roswell Daily Record is that of E.O. Creighton, who was part owner and editor of the Roswell Register before buying into the Record with partner A.A. Burnett in 1899.

According to Fleming’s account, Creighton’s partner at the Register, R.S. Hamilton, was a Republican, while Creighton was a Democrat. They worked at being a politically independent newspaper, but that didn’t work so so. So when Creighton took over the Record, he left the Register

to his Republican owner and declared that the Record would be “Straight Democratic in Politics.”

He lasted about three years, until Harvey F.M. Bear and Charles E. Mason (who also had ownership interests in the Register), bought the Record in late 1902, turned it into a daily and kept it Democratic. Or at least Bear did. Mason had ownership interest in the Register and helped to keep it running as a Republican weekly.

A few years later, the Republican-leaning Mason took over as editor at the Democratic Record, which, Fleming writes, “was problematic for Roswell Democrats.” Ya think?

Nowadays, most newspapers declare themselves independent of party affiliation, though that’s not always the way they come across. When I first arrived at the Daily Record, more than one reader told me the Daily Record was a full supporter of the Republican

Party, though I believe “conservative” is the more accurate moniker for the newspaper at that time. The RDR definitely leaned Republican, but on occasion it would support a Democratic candidate.

And then Barbara Beck came in as publisher.

As a daughter of the legendary New Mexico newspaperman Robert Beck, Barb doesn’t share her more conservative-thinking father’s sentiments, but I’m told they understand and respect their differences. Obviously, he trusts his daughter, since he made her publisher. By my count, Barb’s the 14th publisher of the RDR. Also, if my tabulations are correct, I’m this newspaper’s 22nd editor. During the latter half of last century, three editors in particular stood out for their longevity in the position and their impact on Roswell and the Daily Record: Albert Stubbs, who was editor from 1955 to 1974; Jack Swickard, from

Roswell Daily Record Staff

ADMINISTRATION Barbara Beck Saralei Fajardo Yvonne Salazar Claudia Martinez Curtis Michaels Mary Macias

Publisher HR/Bus. Mgr Bookkeeper Admin Assistant Admin Assistant Office Specialist

ADVERTISING Manny Gonzalez Erika Montoya Andrea Marquez Corinna Martinez Cuitlahuac Gonzalez Edie Stevens Meaghan Cantrell

Ad Director addirector@rdrnews.com Legals legals@rdrnews.com Classifieds classifieds@rdrnews.com Ad Assistant advertising@rdrnews.com Bus. Review businessreview@rdrnews.com Sales Executive advertising1@rdrnews.com Sales Executive advertising2@rdrnews.com

GRAPHIC ARTIST Sandra Martinez Mary Morgan

Ad Designer Ad Designer

sandra@rdrnews.com designer1@rdrnews.com

EDITORIAL Tom McDonald Tim Howsare

Editor Mgr. Editor/Vistas

Aj Dickman Christina Stock Vanessa Kahin Doug Walp Jeff Tucker

Sports/School Vision Editor News Editor/Obits Sports Editor Senior Writer

tmcdonald@rdrnews.com editor@rdrnews.com vistas@rdrnews.com sports2@rdrnews.com vision@rdrnews.com news@rdrnews.com sports@rdrnews.com reporter01@rdrnews.com

bbeck@rdrnews.com sfajardo@rdrnews.com yvonne@rdrnews.com cmartinez@rdrnews.com rdrassist@rdrnews.com

Misty Choy Editorial Assistant Katy Ross Editorial Assistant Bethany Freudenthal Reporter

edasst@rdrnews.com obituaries@rdrnews.com reporter03@rdrnews.com

CIRCULATION Jim Dishman Lacey Dumonteir Robert Norris Maria Vasquez Glen Brooks

Circulation Director jdishman@rdrnews.com District Manager circulation@rdrnews.com District Manager circmanager@rdrnews.com Admin. Circulation Mvasquez@rdrnews.com Dock Clerk

COMPOSING Aric Loomis Toby Martinez Steve Stone

Composing Director aloomis@rdrnews.com Composing Asst. toby@rdrnews.com Designer/Web Coder s.stone@rdrnews.com

PRESS/PLATEROOM Chris Young Lead Pressman Richard Tripp Pressman Byron Bautista Pressman Adrian Orozco Pressman

pressroom@rdrnews.com

Mailroom Terry Clanton Michael Villa William Schwart

Mailroom Supervisor t.clanton@rdrnews.com Mailroom Asst. Supervisor Mailroom Asst. Supervisor

BUILDING John Lujan

Building Maintenance

1974 to 1989; and Jerry McCormack, who held the position from 1989 to 2001.

I’ve only been in the position since October 2015 — after Barb Beck graciously moved me from general manager back to my newsroom “roots” — which is only a brief moment in time. In the context of the RDR’s 125year lifespan, my time here is but the blink of an eye.

It’s a big responsibility, to carry the torch of quality journalism at such an esteemed newspaper. Taking the RDR into the future is a job I will never take lightly, as there’s too much at stake.

There’s a tradition here, to serve our readers, customers and Roswell as a whole in the best way we possibly can. I’m honored to be part of such a mission.

_____

Tom McDonald is the Roswell Daily Record’s editor.

He may be reached at tmcdonald@rdrnews.com or 575622-7710, ext. 302.

The Roswell Daily Record is celebrating a milestone anniversary. Turning 125 means the newspaper has been around since horse and carriages, early Ford cars, and 1950s-era station wagons.

Carriers must have first delivered newspapers by horseback and later on bikes or even walking, throwing out papers to neighborhoods across Roswell and the county.

Our original press was a work of art, with detailed scroll work and a system of printing long lost.

I am looking at the print block of a building that sits on my desk, a reminder of the past. I can’t help but wonder whose desk it sat on in years gone by, or where it sat on the print block that was originally used to produce our newspaper in the 1880s.

For 125 years, this newspaper was the cornerstone of who, what, and where was the Roswell news and community events in the area.

Today the tradition continues. We have a great staff at this newspaper and I appreciate all of them for the hard work they do. All our employees are important pieces in a puzzle that needs all pieces for its completion.

Whether it is the complexity of running a press or the multitasking editorial team, everyone here knows what he or she have to do to get the newspaper out.

The Roswell Daily Record has a tradition of getting the paper out continuously, despite two major fires and a major move. For 125 years our paper never missed a deadline, except one day when a huge storm made it too dangerous for employees to print and get the paper out. That is an amazing record for ANY newspaper, and we are very proud of it.

I am proud to be part of the continuing tradition of newspaper owners who are invested in the Roswell community.

For 80 years, the Beck and the Shearman families have owned and ran the Roswell Daily Record. The Beck family has had several family members serve as publishers, owners, and community members.

I am lucky to have an amazing staff of dedicated people who take pride in what they do.

The times may have changed but the Daily Record is a constant north star in the Roswell sky. ­­——— Barbara Beck is publisher of the RDR. She may be reached at bbeck@rdrnews.com.

125th Anniversary Celebration Section EDITOR’S NOTE: Thanks to the many who contributed to this special section commemorating RDR’s 125th birthday. Special thanks to Aric Loomis for designing the front page and Misty Choy for putting up with a demanding editor in the construction of all the other pages.

— Tom McDonald, editor

125

Roswell Daily Record

Sunday, March 6, 2016

Beck family makes its imprint on Daily Record

By Tom McDonald Roswell Daily Record

While the newspaper industry has been going “corporate” for decades now, not so with the Roswell Daily Record.

Through nearly all of its long life (114 of 125 years) this newspaper’s been owned by two families.

In 1902, Charles E. Mason and his brother in-law Harvey F.M. Bear purchased the Record and immediately turned the weekly into a daily.

They owned, edited and managed the newspaper for the next 30 years.

Then a Chicago newspaperman by the name of Thomas B. Shearman starting buying into Record Publishing Co., and by 1937 he owned the company and its newspaper, outright.

Mason, however, continued on as editor for seven more years.

Shearman remained president of Record Publishing Co. for the next 30 years. His son, William H. Shearman, also played a role in running the newspaper for a time in the late 1940s.

But it would be Thomas Shearman’s son in-law, Robert H. Beck, who would take long-term control of the newspaper.

Beck joined the Daily Record in December 1947 — just a few months after the Record’s famous “flying saucer” headline and story ran — as circulation manager. Previously he’d been a pilot in the Royal Canadian Air Force, then he entered the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II. After the war, he became a commercial pilot for Capital Airlines.

In June 1948, Beck married Marjorie Shear-

man, the elder Shearman’s daughter. Elvis Fleming, author of “History of the Roswell Daily Record, 1891-1991,” wrote that Beck “decided to get into something more stable” than flying for a living. And since his father-in-law was in the newspaper business, he decided to give newspaper work a try.

After two years running the circulation department at the RDR, Beck moved to advertising, where he eventually took over as ad manager. In 1955, he was named publisher — a position he held for the next 32 years.

The Shearman-Beck family ties to the Record grew substantially during the 1950s when Robert and Marjorie Beck, along with Marjorie’s sister, Virginia Shearman Jackson, and her husband Joseph R. Jackson, and the sisters’ two brothers, William Shearman and Tom Shearman Jr., all bought shares in Record Publishing Co. In 1968, the Becks bought out the Shearmans and Robert Beck, who had been RDR publisher for more than a dozen years by then, became president of the parent company, Record Publishing Co. He remains to this day as president.

In 1987, Robert Beck stepped down as the newspaper’s publisher and handed the reins over to his son, Cory.

R. Cory Beck grew up in Roswell, attended New Mexico Military Institute and graduated from Northern Arizona University and did graduate work at Bucknell University. He had worked summers at the RDR and

the Albuquerque Journal, spent three years at the El Paso Times and 3½ years at the Sunbury Daily Item in Pennsylvania before returning to his hometown newspaper as publisher.

But in 2006, he suddenly and unexpected died at age 53. His wife Dana took over as publisher until October 2009.

Charles Fischer was publisher from October 2009 until August 2015.

Barb Beck was named publisher by her father in August 2015.

Barbara Beck is an experienced educator and journalist who worked for the Associated Press for six years in the Middle East — in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia — in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

After that, she returned to the United States to earn a bachelor’s degree in human studies and a master’s degree in curriculum and instruction (education) before pursuing a career in teaching.

She has four adult children. During her career in teaching she was honored as Teacher of the Year in the Portland, Oregon area.

In January, Barbara Beck was named as a director for Record Publishing Company, signaling a shift in leadership for the newspaper and its holdings. In the stockholders’ restructuring, Daniel Russell, publisher of the Hobbs NewsSun, was also appointed director to represent the Shearmans’ interests in Roswell. The Shearman family owns the Hobbs newspaper as well as the American Press in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and the Trinidad Chronicle-News in Colorado.

The Beck and Shear-

3

man families have equal ownership in Record Publishing Co. and the Roswell Daily Record.

Robert and Marjorie Beck are now retired and living in San Diego, California.

Other Becks have also been involved in newspapers through the years, including Robert Beck’s brother, Stuart Beck, who ran the Las Vegas (N.M.) for his brother and sister Marjorie Waters, who published a weekly newspaper in Dallas, Texas.

Robert and Marjorie Beck

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125

Roswell Daily Record

The Record is born into a frontier town

Editor’s note: Prior to the Roswell Daily Record’s 100-year anniversary celebration in 1991, the newspaper retained the services of Elvis E. Fleming, history professor at Eastern New Mexico University-Roswell, to research and write a history of the newspaper going back to its formation in 1891. Fleming’s history of the RDR was then reprinted in its entirety in the newspaper’s special section on March 6, 1991, commemorating its 100th anniversary. For this 125th issue, we’re reprinting excerpts of Fleming’s narrative.

By Elvis Fleming ENMU-R Professor of History Joe Lea and Lucius Dills must have had a lot of optimism when they put out the first issue of the Roswell Record on March 6, 1891.

The little town of Roswell, with a population of 343 in the census of 1890, was not even incorporated yet. In fact, the government of Chaves County had been organized only two months earlier.

And Roswell already had one newspaper: The Roswell Register. The Register was threatening to turn delinquent accounts over to a collection agency. Why, then, would anyone want to start a second newspaper under such unpromising circumstances?

But start it they did. As it turned out, it was the only one of the dozens of papers to be published in Chaves County that would survive to celebrate its centennial, and only one of seven in the state to reach the century mark.

Joseph D. “Joe” Lea, Son of Judge Frank Lea and nephew of Capt. Joseph C. Lea, the “Father of Roswell,” first arrived

in Roswell in 1879. Information about Lea’s activities between 1879 and 1891 is sketchy, but it is know that he worked on a newspaper in Las Cruces. Lea was the first publisher of the Record.

Lucius Dills was born in Kentucky in 1858. He moved to Texas in 1875, was admitted to the bar in 1879, and then arrived in New Mexico in 1885. After several odd jobs around Lincoln, Dills moved to Pat Garrett’s farm east of Roswell in 1887. He started practicing law in Roswell in 1890 and was available as an attorney even after he became the editor of the Roswell Record in March 1891.

Exactly what the financial arrangements between Lea and Dills were is not clear, but apparently they were partners in the newspaper. Others who are listed among the first employees of the Record were Jennie Lea (Joe’s cousin and daughter of

Smith Lea), C.J. McDougall and C.E. Bull.

A delightful study of the Roswell Register and the Roswell Record was done

by Martha Durant Mead for her master’s thesis at the University of New Mexico in 1981, called “‘Written in Water’: A History of Roswell, New Mexico Newspapers, 18881912.” One of her sources was a manuscript on the same subject by Carol Sue Parsons. According to Parsons, the early Record was printed one page at a time on a 10 by 15 Universal jobber and contained eight pages.

Parsons also states, apparently quoting Dills, that the Record “… began business in a little two-room adobe building.

The rooms were so small and so crowded that it was a … puzzle for a countryman to get from the front to the rear door with-

See BORN, Page 5

City proclaims ‘Roswell Daily Record Day’

Proclamation on left: City of Roswell declared March 6, 2016 to be “Roswell Daily Record Day” in honor of the newspaper’s 125th anniversary. Above, RDR staffers pose with Gov. Susana Martinez on a recent Roswell visit in which she presented a Certificate of Congratulations to the Daily Record. Pictured, from left, are Curtis Michaels, RDR administrative assistant; Barbara Beck, publisher; the governor; Bethany Freudenthal, reporter; and Jeff Tucker, senior writer.

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Roswell Daily Record

Born

125

Sunday, March 6, 2016

Continued from Page 4

out knocking something down or piecing a lot of type.” The quotation goes on to state that sometimes the Record was printed on manilla wrapper when they were short on newsprint.

The location of the original offices of the Record is not known. ...

According to Mead, the Record chose to publish on Fridays because the Register published on Saturdays and Dills wanted to get ahead of the competition. In February 1893, C.E. Bull, former Record employee, started running the Register and changed the paper to Tuesdays and then to Wednesdays in 1894. Dills stayed with Friday publication of the Record.

One development that helped the Record get ahead of the Register was the arrival of the telegraph line into Roswell in February 1893, terminating at the office of the Record.

The Record’s printer, C.J. McDougal, assumed the duty of operating the telegraph. ...

The Record office lost the telegraph, according to an item in the August 18, 1893, issue: “C.J. McDougall has moved the telegraph office into the Johnson office building,” Another mention of the telegraph was made in Dec. 8, 1893, issue: “The office of the Pecos Valley Telegraph Co. has moved to the Hotel Pauly.”

The exact location of the Record office is never identified in the 1893-94 volume, but it is believed that it was the second business north of Fourth Street on the west side of Main Street. There is a mention in the Oct. 13, 1893, issue about the Biggs Building, two doors north of the Record office. It is further noted in the Jan. 12, 1894, edition that: “J.M. Biggs is making preparations to build a substantial business house next to the Record.” Interestingly, in the Feb. 9, 1894, issue, mention is made of “Samuel Brown’s rock business block, just north of the Record office.” ...

The Register and the Record were particularly critical of each other when they disagreed. It should be pointed out that they agreed on most major issues, such as statehood.

The editors made frequent cuts at each other, sometimes getting personal. In the Dec. 1, 1893 issue, Dills wrote, “The Register man says that the Red Front is the place to find the best whisky in town; and he knows.”

Lea and Dills sold the Roswell Record to E.O. Creighton in January 1899.

Little is known about what Lea did after the sale, but it is known that he was living in Chihuahua, Mexico, in 1906, where he was engaged in the mining industry. ...

——— E.O. Creighton had been

HSSNM Museum Archives Center photo

The first Record employees pose in the 1892 photo. Seated from left, they are Lucius Dills, editor; Jennie Lea; and standing from left, Joe Lea, publisher; C.J. McDougall and C.E. Bull. part owner and editor of the Roswell Register for about two years before he bought the Roswell Record in partnership with A.A. Burnett. The two men jointly acted as publisher, while Creighton was the editor.

He became sole proprietor in 1900.

Creighton’s partner in the Register, R.S. Hamilton, was a Republican, While Creighton was a Democrat. They therefore tried to follow an independent line politically, but it just didn’t work. When he moved to the Record, Creighton declared that the paper would be “straight Democratic in politics.”

Creighton and his wife worked very diligently and seriously on the Record, giving the paper a somewhat more sober tone than the light-hearted Record of Lucius Dills.

In 1902, Creighton ordered a big cylinder press and was about to order the yearly addition to his composing-room equipment. He had no thought of selling the newspaper, but suddenly he was offered twice what he gave for the paper.

In September, Creighton accepted the offer of Harvey F.M. Bear and Charles E. mason, and they took over the paper on the first October 1902.

——— ... Harvey F.M. Bear, his wife Grace, and their children, Robert and Frances, moved to Roswell from Kansas in 1902. His parents, J.A.B. and Clara, has already been in the area for two or three years, as had his sister, Connie, who was married to Charles E. Mason. Bear had been an educator in Kansas, but

his friendship with William Allen White, the great Kansas editor, may have encouraged him to get into journalism. At any rate, he and Mason, his brother-inlaw, bought the Record in September 1902.

One of the first big moves of Bear as editor of the Record was to start daily publication on March 3, 1903. The weekly Record continued through 1911, much of the space being filled with articles from the daily. According to the information in Porter A. Stratton’s book, “The Territorial Press of New Mexico 1834-1912,” Mason and Bear apparently formed the Record Publishing Co. in March 1903 when they acquired the Register and made the Record a daily.

Stratton also indicates that the daily was called the Roswell Morning Record through August of 1903, then it was changed to the Roswell Daily Record in September and became an afternoon paper. ...

A month after daily publication started, the typographical union went on strike at both the Record and the Register. Mason could not believe the strike was mainly over pay scales; he thought the main problem was a political activist, one Will Robinson. Bear allowed that the”socialist agitators” wanted to dictate the business and political policy of the Record. Mead has concluded that the strike was, indeed, a wage dispute. The union had agreed to certain wages the previous August, not knowing that the Record was going to daily publication.

When that happened, their workload was increased

without a commensurate pay raise. It affected both newspapers because some of the employees worked on both publications. Mead states, “The strike may not have been as uncalled for

as some believed.”

An important event of the Bear years was that the Record, along with several other papers in the Territory, started subscribing to a 500-word daily telegram from the Associated Press

by November 1903. This brought about considerable change in the paper, with much more emphasis on international news.

Mason’s Republican Register and Bear’s Democrat Record were both jointly owned by both men. Therefore, they tried to be gentle in their criticisms of each other’s paper and party.

Their goal was to provide viable papers for members of both parties and, at the same time, not give anyone else an excuse to start a partisan organ in competition with either of theirs.

Everything seemed to be going well.

Then tragedy struck.

Harvey F.M. Bear died suddenly on Jan. 29, 1905, cutting short what had promised to be a brilliant career in journalism. He was just 36.

——— Upon Bear’s death, C.E. Mason took on the job of business manager at the Record. George A. Puckett, already on the Record staff and a good friend of Mason, was appointed editor.

Grace Thorpe Bear replaced her husband as partner in the Record Publishing Co. with Mason.

Mrs. Bear served as society editor for some 35 years after Bear’s death, becoming one of the most respected and prominent women in New Mexico jour-

An unidentified man works at his Record desk.

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5

nalism. Her son, H. Robert Bear, and other members of the family served in various capacities at the Daily Record over the years.

Mason and Puckett believed that the typographical union’s strike of April 1903 was a major factor in Bear’s death. He had worked himself so hard during the strike that it caused a decline in his health from which he never fully recovered. Two years later, Puckett wrote, “… one of the fairest, noblest, more sincere and lovable, and mentally best equipped young men whoever lived in Roswell now sleeps in the south-side cemetery as a result of worry that he concealed even from his own family until his nervous system collapsed.” ...

The newspapers of southeastern New Mexico, according to Stratton, were determined to limit Hispanic domination of territorial politics — or at least in their area. Following the typical “Manifest Destiny” of the East, the editors accepted the proposition that the Anglo-American culture was “progressive, energetic, and generally superior.” The New Mexican was particularly critical of the Daily Record and newspapers in Hagerman, Artesia, and Carlsbad. Suggestions such as the “white primary” and the poll tax were made. In its March 6, 1906, issue, the New Mexican deplored the Daily Record’s call for educational qualifications for voting.

Somewhat inconsistent

See BORN, Page 6

RDR photo

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125

Born

Continued from Page 5

with the above position is the fact that the Daily Record published a biweekly companion paper in Spanish and English called El Registro de Roswell. This paper was published from June 13, 1911, through Aug. 23, 1912, after Mason became editor.

George A. Puckett was editor during the ethnic controversy. He died of tuberculosis on Dec. 30, 1909.

——— ... On May 2, 1911, the Daily Record got ahead of the competition again by leasing the full wire service from the Associated Press.

Two years later this affiliation was dropped in favor of the United Press. The May 26, 1914, issue for the first time credited front-page national news stories to the United Press. On July 1, 1914, the words “Member of the United Press” began to appear along with the paper’s name on the front page flag. ...

That fall, the Daily Record began a regular feature of Progressive Republican editorials. Since this was during the “Progressive Era,” it seems that there weren’t many important differences between Progressive Republicans and Progressive Democrats. Mead concludes that “Mason’s original party affiliations were beginning to show....So, quietly, and perhaps subconsciously, the Roswell Daily Record took on a Republican cast.”

Mason never claimed that the Record was Republican, however. The paper’s masthead continued to proclaim that it was “Democratic in Politics” until June 1911. Soon after Mason started listing himself as editor, the paper’s slogan was changed to “A Progressive - Democratic Newspaper,” an appellation which appeared on the masthead through December 5, 1918. Predictably, perhaps, the Daily Record declared itself “An

Independent Newspaper” on December 6 and continued to carry that designation until December 22, 1919, when all references to the paper’s politics were dropped. ...

——— ... Under the name “Roswell Daily Record” was the notation “Daily Record and Evening News Combined.”

This notation was used for several years. The merger of the Record and the News represents some eight different publications in that branch of the Record’s “family tree,” going all the way back to the Pecos Valley Register. The Daily Record “... finally achieved seniority over its competitors,” Mead states, “and therefore authority among its reading public.”

The Roswell Daily Record had originated at a time when politicians used newspapers as political tools. A newspaper’s political stance was an important element of its identity in Territorial New Mexico.

The Daily Record, designated as New Mexico’s first Democratic newspaper,‘ began breaking with that tradition in 1909 and in 1918 declared itself independent. For a while, no mention was made of the paper’s official political position.

However, on May 14, 1926, Mason felt compelled once again to serve notice that the Daily Record was “Independent in Politics.”

This slogan first appeared during the primary season and next to a column of political announcements.

After January: 25, 1933, the political reference was dropped. ...

——— Thomas B. Shearman of Chicago began buying into the Record Publishing Company in 1932, and by July 31, 1937, he was the sole owner. Operations at the Daily Record remained basically unchanged, as Charlie Mason continued to run the paper for a few more years.

Shearman did not live in Roswell, but he had a business in Chicago, Inland

Newspaper; which represented a number of small daily newspapers to national advertisers. He bought a newspaper in Lake Charles, La., in the mid-1940s and moved there.

——— C. E. Mason continued as editor of the Roswell Daily Record after he and Grace Thorpe Bear sold the publishing company to Shearman. ...

Mason officially continued as editor of the Daily Record through June of 1944, although he actually retired “with pay” in late May, ending one of the longest careers in Roswell newspaper history. His co-publisher and co-worker for the greater part of his career was his sister-in-law, Grace T. Bear.

Mrs. Bear passed away on December 22, 1955. Mason died on September 17, 1959, at the age of 85.

——— ... Summers’ tenure as publisher, as listed on the Daily Record masthead, was continuous through July 1947. There was a period in August and September in which his

Roswell Daily Record

name did not appear. William H. Shearman, son of Record President Thomas B. Shearman, was shown as publisher from Aug. 1 through Aug. 12, 1947. No publisher was listed until Sept. 9, when Summers’ name appeared again and continued more-or-less constantly through Dec. 19, 1948, when the practice of listing a publisher, other than the Record Publishing Co., was stopped for the time being.

——— ... Don C. Wright resumed the duties of editor of the Daily Record on Monday, April 19, 1948. He retained his interest in his Missouri newspapers, but he felt compelled to return to the Land of Enchantment for his health’s sake.

In his first editorial after returning, he wrote, “Seven months absence from Roswell gives one a new perspective, and adds to this newspaper’s often repeated advice to not sell Roswell short... Frequently it is the case that the folks who live in and with the community day in and day out for

See BORN, Page 7

HSSNM Museum Archives Center photo

Outside the Roswell Record, around 1910, at 402 N. Main St. On the far left is Harvey M. F. Bear, publisher, and beside him is C.E. Mason, editor.

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Born

125

Sunday, March 6, 2016

Continued from Page 6

years on end, fail to properly observe and evaluate the progress that goes on.

An absence, however, calls attention to what is and has been going on, and impresses one that development can go unnoticed.”

——— Robert H. Beck of Detroit joined the Daily Record staff in December 1947 as circulation manager. Until that time, his career had been that of a pilot. He learned to fly in the Royal Canadian Air Force. when the U.S. entered World War II, he transferred to the U.S. Army Air Corps and was a “hump pilot” in the China-Burma-India Theater of Operations.

After the war, he became a commercial pilot for Capital Airlines. As he looked forward to marriage, Beck decided to get into something more stable. He had known Marjorie Shearman virtually all his life, and since her father was president of the Record Publishing Co., newspaper work seemed like a logical choice for Beck’s new career. He said, “Being circulation manager was quite different from being an airline pilot.”

Beck and Ms. Shearman were married in June 1948. Two years after joining the Daily Record staff, he transferred to the advertising department and was manager of that department within five years. Then in 1955, Beck was appointed publisher of the Daily Record — a position which he kept until 1987.

Later in the 1950s, he became a partner in the publishing company when he and his wife, her sister and husband — Mr. and Mrs. Joseph R. Jackson, and her two brothers, William and Tom, Jr., all bought shares.

In 1968, the Becks bought out the Shearmans. At that time, Robert H. Beck became president of the Record Publishing Co. He continues in the office of president in 1991, although he gave up the position of publisher in 1987. Since 1968, the only stockholders in the publishing company have been the Becks and Jacksons and their children.

——— On Dec. 30, 1955, Albert A. Stubbs, 31, officially took over the editor’s position. Publisher Robert H. Beck appointed him with the title of “Managing Editor.” Stubbs was a Roswell native, a veteran of World War II, and a graduate of the University of Kentucky. He had been the news editor of the Roswell Morning Dispatch for about a year when, in the fall of 1949, he joined the Daily Record as a reporter/photographer. 1954, Stubbs received the Associated Press Managing Editor’s Award in recognition of his crew’s coverage of the last great flood in Roswell in May 1954.

As a writer and editor of the Daily Record, Stubbs played a major role in the establishment of the Eastern New Mexico Medical Center. His editorials were named as the best among New Mexico’s daily newspapers for three successive years, 1960-62. He headed the New Mexico Press Association in 196667. ...

During the tenure of Al Stubbs as editor, the Roswell Daily Record itself was a major source of local news stories. One such story was the big fire that hit the Record plant at 424 N. Main on Sunday morning, April 7, 1963. ...

Damage to mechanical equipment in the composing room was heavy. All spare parts for type-setting equipment were ruined, a partition was burned away, and rolls of newsprint in a nearby storage area were damaged by water. One of the worst aspects was

HSSNM Museum Archives Center photo

Three Record employees — from left, Grace Thorpe Bear, Conie Bear Mason and Cecil Bonney — in the Record office at 315 N. Main St., December 1915. No photo of the outside of the building has been found. that the roof was partially burned away, and melting tar from the roof dripped on the seven linotype machines, damaging some of them extensively.

The entire building, which was owned by Litz McGee and leased by the Record Publishing Co., sustained heavy smoke and water damage.

The cause of the fire was at first reported to be an explosion of a melting furnace, but this proved to be inaccurate. Problems in the electrical wiring seemed most likely to be the cause. Damage was estimated by Publisher Robert H. Beck to be as much as $100,000, but he figured the entire cost of improvising and repair might run as high as $300,000. He later stated that the actual cost exceeded $400,000.

Editor Stubbs and about a dozen of his staff gathered up what they could and headed for Hobbs.

The facilities of the Hobbs News-Sun were used for about a week to publish the Daily Record while cleaning and repairing of the equipment and building was going on in Roswell. ...

Staff Writer Norman Rourke wrote, “ The mammoth paper-devouring press looked sick as the rolls of paper — webbed through its machinery — hung limp from the washing down it got from streams of water that burst through into the burning building. Charred timbers, smoked and scorched machinery all covered with ashes, soot and general fire-created trash, added to the deathly silence broken only by workmen who already were beginning their long cleanup process.” ...

Perhaps one of the greatest responsibilities thrust upon the Daily Record under Al Stubbs’ leadership was that of serving as the community’s voice during the troubled times of the late 1960s and early 1970s when Roswell was dealing with the closure of Walker Air Force Base. Stubbs and the Record provided much encouragement and powerful leadership in Roswell’s “bootstrap” efforts to get out of the economic doldrums and on the way to prosperity.

It was “deja vu all over again” for the staff of the Daily Record on Tuesday, October 6, 1970, when the newspaper plant at 424 N. Main was again visited by fire. This time, the fire was mainly in the front half of the building, with the heaviest damage in the news and advertising departments and the “ad alley” where advertisements were composed.

The Record’s automatic alarm system triggered a signal at Central Fire Station at 1:14 a.m. The fire was confined to the attic for so long that heat was slow in setting off the

alarm. When the firefighters arrived, only smoke was visible, but flames soon came through the roof. When the ceiling collapsed, intense heat and flames were sent into the news and advertising offices.

Publisher Robert H. Beck stated that the press and the composing area where the linecasting machines were located, appeared to be only slightly damaged by smoke, heat, and water.

He made no estimate of the damage or cause of the fire. ...

Beck declared, “We’ve never missed an edition yet, including the time of our previous fire, and we won’t miss any with this one. The Roswell Daily Record has always been blessed with fine personnel and in an emergency of this sort they pitch in 100 percent, and we want to give our thanks to the fine efforts of the Roswell Fire Department. Those boys did a fine job of containing the fire.”

Editor Stubbs and eight staff members went to the Hobbs News-Sun as they had 7 1/2 years earlier to get the Daily Record out. ...

Even before the fire on Oct. 6, 1970, plans were already in the mill to build a new home for the Roswell Daily Record on North Main at the corner of East 23rd Street.

Planning had begun in 1969 to change over to more modern computerized typesetting and offset printing, but this could not be done in the old building downtown. The fire could not even accelerate the plan, because there was no way to speed up the delivery of the new printing press, which was due in April or May 1971.

Publisher Robert Beck and Production Manager Al Geary developed the basic plan for the new facility after visiting several new newspaper plants in the West. ...

Some of the most dramatic moments for the Daily Record staff regarding the move to the new plant at 2301 N. Main St. involved the old and new printing presses. The last letterpress issue of the Daily Record came off the press at 424 N. Main St. about 1 a.m. on Sunday, June 27, 1971.

Appropriately enough, the button to start the letter-press for the last run was pushed by Al Geary, production superintendent. As a pressman, Geary had also pushed the button the first time the press was used to print the Daily Record back in 1949.

At 4 p.m. on Monday, June 28, 1971, Record Publisher Robert H. Beck pushed the button to start the Record’s new Goss Urbanite 32-page offset press to turn out the very first edition of the paper ever to be printed on that

press. ...

——— Record Publisher Robert H. Beck announced on July 28, 1974, that Jack M. Swickard of Albuquerque would replace Stubbs as editor of the Daily Record.

Swickard had started his newspaper career in Indianapolis in 1963, then joined the Albuquerque Tribune in 1965. After a short time, he entered the U.S. Army and became a combat helicopter pilot in Vietnam.

Swickard was a hero in the Vietnam War and was awarded two Distinguished Flying Crosses, the Bronze Star Medal, 24 Air Medals, the Viet-

by the Daily Record, two for the Roswell reporters and one each for the regional reporters. Using telephones, the reporters could now transmit stories directly to the main computer at the Daily Record office. The computer not only collected and stored reporters‘ articles, but it also received Associated Press stories transmitted at 1,200 words per minute through a satellite dish mounted on the roof of the Daly Record plant.

What would Lucius Dills and C. E. Mason think about that?

——— Robert H. Beck stepped down as publisher of the Daily Record on Nov. 5,

7

hardest decision he had ever had to make in his adult life. ...

——— Jerry R. McCormack ... became editor of the Roswell Daily Record on June 23, 1989, after having served as managing editor for 14 1/2 years, 1974-89.

McCormack first joined the Daily Record staff in 1969 ...

——— In a presentation to the Chaves County Historical Society on February 9, 1987, Daily Record Publisher Robert H. Beck lamented the decline of family-owned newspapers in the United States. He stated that more than 60 percent of the 1,750 daily newspapers in this country are owned by groups, and groups have different motives from family-owned papers. One of his goals is to keep the Daily Record in the family.

Amazingly, the Daily Record has been controlled by only two different groups of related families for 89 of its 100 years of history. C. E. Mason and his brother-in-law, Harvey F. M. Bear, bought the Record in 1902. Mason himself was co-owner for 35 years and editor for 39. His sonin-law and possibly others were on the staff at various times. Bear’s widow, son, daughter, and grandson all worked on the paper for varying lengths of time.

Thomas Shearman got control of the Daily Record in 1937. Ten years later, his son-in-law-to-be, Robert H. Beck, joined the paper, becoming publisher in 1955. Beck and his wife’s brothers and Joseph R. Jackson became partners in the Record Publishing Co. in the late

HSSNM Museum Archives Center photo

The Roswell Daily Record at 424 N. Main St., where the newspaper was located from July 1925 to June 1971. namese Cross of Gallantry, and several others. He set a record for the fastest air rescue by picking up a downed aircraft’s crew from the midst of an enemy regiment in 40 seconds. ...

The Daily Record tried to stay up with the latest technology in the 1980s.

The One Systems computers, the first at the new plant, were later replaced by Compugraphic models, and still later — about 1986 — by MicroTek computers. Also, in the late 1980s, the Daily Record started using laser printers for computer print-outs. All of these changes were intended to make the paper’s operations more efficient and to produce a better quality product. ...

Monday, Oct. 1, 1984, was a major turning point in the history of the Roswell Daily Record. On that date, the Daily Record became a morning newspaper, after years as an afternoon or evening paper. This change made the Daily Record the only morning paper in Southern New Mexico. ...

Four portable computer terminals were purchased

1987, to be replaced by his son, Robert Cory Beck, 34. Cory Beck returned to Roswell and the Daily Record in December 1986 and served almost a year as assistant to the publisher.

Beck was educated in Roswell and Southboro, Mass. He attended New Mexico Military Institute, graduated from Northern Arizona University, and did graduate work at Bucknell University. As a youth, he worked summers at the Daily Record and the Albuquerque Journal. He spent three years with the El Paso Times and 3 1/2 years at the Sunbury (Pennsylvania) Daily Item. He became very active in community activities after his return to Roswell. He married Marilee Hall-Beck on July 22, 1989. ...

Publisher Cory Beck announced on May 18, 1989, that Jack Swickard would be leaving the editor’s post at the Daily Record as of June 22 to accept a position as managing editor of the Farmington Daily Times.

Swickard stated that the decision to resign from the Daily Record was the

1950s. Beck retired as publisher in 1987 and relinquished the reins to his son, Cory.

Other relatives of the Becks are involved with newspapers, too. Robert and his brother, Stuart, have owned the oldest daily paper in New Mexico — the Las Vegas Optic — since 1968. Their sister, Marjorie Waters, publishes a weekly in the Park Cities area of Dallas. Robert and Marjorie Beck’s youngest daughter, Barbara, was formerly an Associated Press correspondent for Saudi Arabia. She [lived] in Las Cruces and does some writing for the papers.

The Beck’s other daughters are Carol, a teacher in Georgia, and Mary Kate, who lives in Scottsdale, Arizona.

“A Century of.Commitment” — the Roswell Daily Record’s centennial slogan — is borne out in the pages of history. Joe Lea, Lucius Dills, Charlie Mason, Harvey Bear, Grace Thorpe Bear, and other pioneer newspaper people of Roswell — just look what you have wrought!

8 Sunday, March 6, 2016

By Timothy P. Howsare Roswell Daily Record Was it a flying saucer or a weather balloon?

Conflicting stories were presented to the world in 1947 in the July 8 and 9 editions of the Roswell Daily Record.

The July 8 headline proclaimed: “RAAF Captures Flying Saucer on Ranch in Roswell Region.”

The next day the newspaper has a rather puzzling banner across the entire front page that read: “Gen. Ramey Empties Roswell Saucer.”

Empties flying saucer?

What was in it? The front page didn’t say.

A smaller headline on the far right column seems like it should have been the main headline: “Ramey Says Excitement Is Not Justified.”

But the excitement had already begun and there was no amount of back-peddling the government and military could do to quell it.

125 Before the Ramey story begins, a few paragraphs in bold-face type were interjected between the headline and story stating that “flying saucer fever” had spread as far as Tehran, Iran.

Even though, on July 8, the Daily Record reported the intelligence office at the Roswell Army Air Field said the Army did recover a flying saucer, the story is more or less recanted within 24 hours when Gen. Roger M. Ramey, commander of the Eighth Forces, went on record saying the mysterious object was a crashed weather balloon.

Another article on the July 9 front page reports that a weather forecaster from the U.S. Weather Service stationed in Roswell “was disposed to agree with the army officials that the so-called disk” was likely a radar-controlled balloon from the weather service.

A third article on the July 9 front page reported on how the rancher who located the “saucer” was “sorry

he told about it.”

The article stated that the rancher, W.W. Brazel, and his 8-year-old son came upon a large area of “bright wreckage” on June 14. Brazel didn’t tell his wife about the wreckage until July 4.

The next day, Brazel said he heard about the flying disks and wondered if what he found might be the remains of one of these.

When he went into town a day or two later, he “whispered” to then Sheriff George Wilcox that he might have found a flying disk.

Wilcox contacted the Army, who picked up the pieces at the crash site but were unable to reconstruct it.

At the end of the article, Brazel stated he had found on previous occasions two weather observation balloons, but his new discovery in no way resembled either of those.

“I am sure what I found was not any weather observation balloon,” he said.

“But if I find anything besides a bomb they are

going to have a hard time getting me to say anything.”

Roswell’s fame as the “Alien City” is intertwined with those two iconic front pages.

Those two front pages are now collectors items that adorn the fronts of T-shirts and are plastered on coffee mugs. Television production companies as far away as Japan have requested permission to use reproductions in documentaries.

They have been immortalized in pop culture, most recently in the reboot of “The X-Files,” which began its storyline with the 1947 incident in Roswell.

Whether the object was a flying saucer or a weather balloon is a question that still remains unanswered after nearly 70 years.

But what will always remain is the story of the worldwide frenzy after the Roswell Daily Record broke the story.

Managing editor Timothy P. Howsare can be contacted at 575-622-7710, ext. 301, or editor@rdrnews.com.

Roswell Daily Record

July 8, 19

47 issue

HSSNM Museum Archives Center photo Right, Maj. Jesse A. Marcel holds pieces of debris found at the crash site on July 8, 1947, in Brig.

Gen. Roger Ramey’s Forth Worth, Texas office. That same day, RDR published in its daily edition, above, that Roswell Army Air Field found a crashed “flying saucer” just outside of Roswell on a ranch near Corona.

In the next day’s edition, left, the Daily Record reported on the Army’s contention that it wasn’t a “flying saucer” but a high-altitude weather balloon that had fallen to earth. The denial was initially effective in quashing the story as news of the incident faded away for decades, only to begin to resurface in the 1980s as The Roswell Incident.

e

947 issu

July 9, 1

Former printer recalls his adventures

RDR photo

Daily Record officials circle a cake recognizing the newspaper’s 100th anniversary in on March 6, 1991. Clockwise from left are Georgene Smyth, circulation manager; John Pettit, advertising director; Jerry R. McCormack, editor; R. Cory Beck, publisher; Jim Richards, classified advertising manager; Ben Sanchez, production director; and Jean Pettit, business director. Not pictured from this 1991 leadership team is Alex Clark, operations manager.

Editor’s note: Earl Dixon, a Roswell resident from 1914 to 1946, wrote the following letter to the Daily Record in 1991, at the age of 80, after learning that the newspaper was celebrating its 100th birthday.

I first sold the Record on the street and then later had a paper route.

In 1927 I became a fulltime employee of the Record as their printer’s devil. That job included everything — sweeping out, setting ads, working on the press, etc.

That linotype was more complicated so it took a lot more time to master, but I was lucky to become a very proficient operator on those old, worn-out machines.

During the Great Depression days of the early 1930s, the busi-

Newspaper interests bright child

Editor’s note: The following ran in the Roswell Daily Record on Sunday, Aug. 22, 1971, in a special section commemorating the opening of the Daily Record’s new facility at 2301 N. Main St. You can measure how bright your children are by the time and interest they devote to the newspaper.

That was one conclusion apparent from a survey by Dr. Wilbur Schramm of Stanford University.

How do your own youngsters rate against these

findings?

Dr. Schramm found that newspaper reading is negligible until a child is 7, but it then zooms. Children start with the comics, of course, but strong interest develops in every section of the paper by the time they are 12.

By that age two-thirds of them read a newspaper daily and only a handful never pay any attention to one.

Intellectual ability has a lot to do with it.

Eighth graders in the top fifth of their class, for instance, lead the bottom fifth two-to-one as daily readers. Between the 10th and 12th grades the newspaper moves up to rank just behind books in getting the attention of children.

Another finding in the study is of importance to fathers and mothers: After children reach age 10, their habits are shaped by the amount of reading the parents do.

ness office of the Roswell Daily Record at 424 N. Main St. looked like anything but a business office. Its counters and walls were lined with boxes and sacks of vegetables from home gardens — radishes, onions and tomatoes — traded in for subscriptions to the paper.

Times were rough and people were trading anything to try to keep things going. The employees of the paper were encouraged to take vegetables and other trade-in produce home with them.

So many things happened through those years it is hard to know just where to start.

I do remember when the Battery A came back from France and Col. DeBremmond’s “boys”

lived up on the Chaves County Courthouse steps, and their commander praised them all and their fine record in World War I. One Sunday morning in about 1932, we had an earthquake that pulled many of the fireplaces away from the houses, but thank goodness it was a small shake.

In the early 1930s, a tornado came from SixMile Hill and destroyed a large brick home near the Roswell airport, then swept across Main Street to move three houses halfway off their foundations just north of the NMMI polo field.

The Associated Press machines in the old Record office gave us the news one cold morning that Roswell was the

coldest place in the United States at 35 degrees below zero. This lasted three days and at noon it was still a very cold zero degrees — even with the sun shining. We lost all of our beautiful apple orchards around the city.

In 1935, I was running a linotype machine on a beautiful day when in the afternoon, about 2 p.m., the building and everything near it went suddenly dark — like midnight. It was a black blizzard — like those in Oklahoma, Texas, Colorado and all of the Southwest. It passed on within an hour.

Congratulations on the 100th year of bringing the news to eastern New Mexico. With best wishes I am — Earl Dixon, 1234 First Ave., Salinas, Calif.

HSSNM photo Main Street in Roswell sometime between 1901 and 1905. View is to the south from in front of the courthouse.

125

Roswell Daily Record

Sunday, March 6, 2016

9

Making headlines from RDR front pages through the years B.P.O.E. Stands for Best People On Earth ...

Roswell Welcomes Them

April 6, 1917

— July 27, 1905

REPUBLICANS WOULD STEAL CREDIT

FOR THE FEDERAL RESERVE ACT

— Oct. 4, 1916

CANNING FACTORY WORK

TO BEGIN IN NEAR FUTURE NEW MEXICO HAS A C. OF COMMERCE

— May 2, 1921

— March 14, 1919

April 17, 1928

INDUSTRIAL DEPRESSION HAS REACHED LOW POINT

AND FROM NOW ON IMPROVEMENT STARTS

— Jan. 24, 1921

Cardinals Even Up World Series By Defeating

Yankees, 10 to 2

— Oct. 9 1926

June 10, 1932

CARLSBAD CAVERN BECOMES NATIONAL PARK AS HOOVER SIGNS BILL ...

— May 15, 1930

Mrs. Gladys O’Donnell Leads Air Racers

Into Roswell From El Paso ...

— Aug. 26, 1931

$78 Billion Budget Brings GOP

Cries of ‘Fantastic’ ...

Missile Expert Is Ordered To Trial

Handout Of Secret Papers Is Charged

— March 5, 1957

Nixon and President Will Map Strategy

Kennedy To Depart From California Today

— Oct. 31, 1960

Lyndon B. Johnson Inaugurated

36th President of the United States ...

— Jan. 20, 1965

In 1971, RDR staff put together a special section and open house to celebrate the opening of its new offices and press plant along North Main, where the Daily Record remains today. This are the front pages of the two-run section.

Nov. 25, 1963

— Jan. 9, 1953

10 Sunday, March 6, 2016

125

Artist Sarah Beck is a daughter of Roswell Daily Record Publisher Barbara Beck and granddaughter to Robert and Marjorie Beck.

Former editor: RDR binds our community; written word endures

By Jerry McCormack Daily Record Editor 1989-2001

The Roswell Daily Record is celebrating its 125th anniversary this month.

So what?

That’s a typical response for some people because when some of us read that a business, institution, organization or university is celebrating an anniversary we tend to just read right over it and move on.

Let me tell you, though, the RDR’s 125th anniversary deserves more than a quick read and a footnote in our busy days. It is a monumental achievement. It is a big deal. It is something that many newspapers in American can only dream about and work toward, and only a few actually accomplish it and can boast about it. There are just five or six newspapers in New Mexico, as a matter of fact, that have achieved that milestone.

As a former RDR staffer for 32 years and editor for the last 12 years of my tenure, the 125th celebration has grabbed my attention and warmed my heart.

That’s because I was editor back in 1991 when the RDR celebrated its 100th anniversary, and I remember that centennial celebration just like it was yesterday. It was an honor and a thrill for me, and our entire organization of 61 employees at that time, as I’m sure it is for current Editor Tom McDonald and his crew now.

So, I was extremely excited when Tom called me on Monday and asked if I would like to write a column for the 125th anniversary issue. I said, “Yes, of course I would.” My mind immediately started racing to try and remember some of the highlights of the newspaper’s outstanding history. And, then he said, “Oh, yeah, Jerry, your deadline is Wednesday.”

After a few seconds of sheer panic, I remembered … so goes the life of an editor. I remember those days all too well. I lived on a deadline 24/7 for more than three decades — and I loved every minute of it.

Our theme for the 100th anniversary issue in 1991 was “A Century of Commitment.”

The 125th anniversary issue doesn’t have a theme, but the newspaper is stressing “Celebrating 125 Years of Newspaper Excellence Over the Generations” at this time.

Both thoughts are fitting tributes to a newspaper that has fulfilled its commitment of journalism excellence over and over to its readers daily for 125 years. And, what’s really exciting is that there are many more years of service to come for its readers.

I have to say the RDR has come a long way.

The newspaper began with Publisher Joseph D. Lea and Editor Lucius Dills on March 6, 1891, and has prospered under the leadership of an outstanding list of publishers and editors over the years up to

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Top photo, longtime Editor Jerry McCormack stands next to Publisher Cory Beck in this 1991 photo. Their staff produced the special commemorative section for the newspaper’s 100th anniversary, right. Above is the retired McCormack today. and especially including present-day Publisher Barbara Beck and Editor Tom McDonald.

The printing of the newspaper has definitely changed over the years, from the first edition of the crude black-and-white Roswell Record in 1891 to the slick, bright and colorful Roswell Daily Record of today.

Printing and technology advances over the years have changed it from a crude, hard-to-read publication in the beginning to an attractive, easy-to-read newspaper of today.

I remember the drastic changes I saw first-hand in just my short tenure, 1969 to 2001, from the old hot type, letter press process at the previous location at 424 N. Main St. to the present cold type, offset press process of the modern facility of today at 2301 N. Main St. It’s a world of difference.

I can attest to that. For one thing, we didn’t wear longsleeve white shirts at the downtown location because we usually ended the day with ink smudges from our fingertips to our elbows.

We appreciated the move north in 1972. It was much cleaner and quieter.

We had outstanding leaders during the 100th celebration. R. Cory Beck was publisher, I was editor, John Pettit was advertising director, Jim Richards was classified advertising manager, Jean Pettit was business director, Ben Sanchez was production director, Georgene Smyth was circulation manager and Alex Clark was operations manager.

Cory and John have passed, Jean now lives in South Texas and the other five of us still live in Ros-

well.

We were much like the outstanding team today that includes Barbra Beck as publisher, Tom McDonald as editor, SaraLei Fajardo as business manager, Manny Gonzalez as advertising director, Aric Loomis as composing director and Jim Dishman as circulation director.

There have been a few other leaders in between these two teams that we need to mention as well.

After the untimely death of Cory in 2006, the RDR publishers were Dana Beck and Charles Fischer before Barbara Beck assumed the publisher’s chair in 2015.

And, after I retired in 2001, the RDR editors were Mike Bush, Andrew Portiner and Tim Howsare, before Tom McDonald moved into the editor’s office last year as well.

We all were and are dedicated professionals who love the art of communications and the smell of ink and newsprint. It gets in your blood, believe me, and it stays there forever.

We and hundreds of others through the 125 years have helped the RDR to remain the news leader of Roswell and Chaves County throughout its history.

It’s a role that is envied by my many friends in the electronic media because although radio and television stations also provide news, it is the written word that has endured through the years and has passed the test of time repeatedly.

The RDR, without question, has been, is today and will be in the future the one thing that binds our community.

Congratulations to the Roswell Daily Record on your 125th anniversary!

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