Town-Crier Newspaper
THE EARLY YEARS
A Family-Owned Newspaper Where Everyone Was Part Of A Big Family
BY BARBARA YORESH
More than three decades after my initial tenure as a staff writer at the Town-Crier, the recollection of time spent might seem a bit like yesterday’s news. Yet for me and more than a few of my 1980s-era Town-Crier colleagues, the memories remain fresh and relevant. The young newspaper and its editions within the western communities were invaluable informational sources in a part of the county that was exploding with growth and development. While the newspaper mattered greatly to area residents, we who helped produce it coalesced into something of a family, whose ties to each other still lovingly bind.
PAGE 2 • TOWN-CRIER 40TH ANNIVERSARY SOUVENIR MAGAZINE • 1980 - 2020
CUTTING MY TEETH I came on board under my previous surname of McNeely via an unsolicited piece I had submitted in December 1985 about rock star David Crosby’s incarceration in the Palm Beach County jail. That piece led to an offer of employment as a full-time staff writer, and I joined the newspaper’s team the same week in January 1986 that NASA’s space shuttle Challenger exploded shortly after its launch at Cape Canaveral. I was 36 years old, and Miz ’Neely — publisher Bob Markey Sr.’s handle for me — had become a “cub” reporter and was senior in age to most of my writing colleagues by at least 10 years. Thus began a reporter’s career, which to date has spanned more than 34 years. The depth and breadth of subjects was infinite and, for someone like me who hated the hum-drum boredom of a typical 9-to-5 desk job, being out there covering everything and everyone was remarkably stimulating.
VARIETY WAS THE SPICE OF LIFE The Royal Palm Beach Village Council, and the Indian Trail and Loxahatchee Groves water control districts, were my main “beats,” but I also enjoyed writing countless feature articles about the people and entities of the western communities. I even wrote a cooking column for a time. I’ve interviewed the famous and John Q. Public; covered local governments; written countless columns, editorials and feature articles; and became, now, at age 70, a “specialist” in covering arts and entertainment who still writes for Vero Beach’s Riverside Theatre. Those mid-1980s days at the newspaper’s previous offices at Wellington’s Commerce Park on Pierson Road were filled with a sense of urgency to report about the quickly developing western communities. So many issues to explore, so many key players to meet with and build rapport, so much to write about and deadlines were always looming. More than 30 years later, there are more than a few former staff writers who continue to write or edit newspapers. Ron Dupont Jr. — who began writing for the Town-Crier while still in high school — is an editor with Sun Coast Media in Venice, Fla., while former Sports Editor Larry Hobbs currently writes for the Brunswick News in Georgia and is the author of two books available on Amazon about Georgia’s Golden Isle coastal region. Former writer Laura Farrell (now Laura Lemmon) is an editor with Gannett’s Treasure Coast Newspapers group. SPELL CHECK OR DIE Less-than-reliable electric service to our offices in the 1980s rendered the newspaper nearly dead-in-the-water when shortly
Barbara Yoresh, then Barbara McNeely, wrote for the Town-Crier during the Markey family era for about six years starting in 1986. She has remained a friend of the newspaper, occasionally working on special projects. She was thrilled to be able to catch up with old friends while working on this project.
Early Town-Crier staff members with one of several awards the newspaper won from the Florida Press Association. (Front row, L-R) Larry Hobbs, Jennifer Daniel, Bonnie O. Goldberg, Bob Markey Sr., Bob Markey II, Barbara McNeely (now Yoresh) and Ron Dupont Jr. Our apologies to the unidentified staff member in the back.
before final deadline and printing, a brief electrical outage zapped all our computer files, and most of us writers hadn’t remembered to “back up our files” (given as an
edict by Editor Bob Markey II) on the floppy disks used at the time. Boy, did we scramble to do our best to quickly re-write from memory our respective copy for the week’s
edition, which in the end published on time. If Bob II’s threat of “spell check or die” didn’t really carry a lethal penalty, we reporters nonetheless learned the journalistic rules of the road via repeated references to the Associated Press Stylebook, which is a newspaperman’s “bible.” WE ARE FAMILY There was an esprit de corps among all departments of the newspaper that collectively made it all come together by deadline. We were, to be sure, co-workers. But I and others of that 1980s era also remember a sense of family that extended from the newspaper’s owner to all employees. We were the Town-Crier family, and many long-time friendships and (Left) A Town-Crier holiday season photo from the early 1980s. (Front row) Eunice Cromey, Peter Ressegue, Teri Bensinger and Karen Wiggan; (middle row) Audrey Radin, Sue Ceynowa, Pat Markey and Jim Cromey; and (back row) Romy Silvester, Ray Plockelman, Bob Markey Sr., Gunda Caldwell, Joe Cromey and Tom Sawyer.