SOUNDER THE ISLANDS’
Serving Orcas, Lopez and San Juan County
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WEDNESDAY, May 14, 2014 VOL. 47, NO. 20 75¢ www.islandssounder.com
Saying goodbye to Ted Grossman by COLLEEN SMITH ARMSTRONG Editor/Publisher
With his mop of white hair and pen and pad in hand, Ted Grossman was an icon of Orcas Island. “Ted was the consummate small town newsman,” said Elyse Van den Bosch, former publisher of The Islands’ Sounder. Grossman, a past owner and editor of the Sounder, passed away on May 3. He was at the helm of the newspaper for 21 years, covering the joys and heartbreak of a community he adored. “He had his reporter's hat on 24/7 and really believed that the local newspaper could and should be a valuable community resource,” Van den Bosch said. “He was a compassionate and sensitive person who cared as much about the smaller human interest stories as he did the more dramatic, hard news ones.” Ted first got newsprint on his fingers at his high school’s newspaper in Connecticut. He majored in history at Lafayette College in Pennsylvania but was on the editorial staff of the college newspaper for all four years. He served as layout editor, managing editor and sports editor. After graduating, he attended Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern
Colleen Smith Armstrong photo
University in Chicago. But in 1963, he left to join the Peace Corps. It was in Peace Corps training in Hilo, Hawaii that he met his future wife, Kay. They were assigned to adjacent islands in the Philippines, and continued their courtship, commuting by ferry to see each other on weekends. They were married in 1964 at the Archbishop’s Palace. After the Peace Corps, Ted attended Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studies at the University of Michigan, majoring in history. He completed his doctoral oral exams and received a Fulbright Scholarship to the Philippines and Spain to conduct research for his doctoral dissertation on the role of Filipinos in the Spanish Colonial Army. After returning to the states in
1970, Ted taught history in Texas. In 1975, he was recruited by longtime friend Leonel Castillo to work with Hispanic International University and guide it through an affiliation with Antioch University, establishing it as a “University Without Walls” program. Ted then returned to his passion: journalism. “Ted wanted to be a doer, make a difference,” Kay said. “Through journalism, I think he found a way to do that. He became fed up with the academic world and the ‘ivory tower’ mentality. After hauling around boxes of notes for his PhD dissertation, he burned the lot of them. He had for the most part finished a rough draft of his dissertation, but it all went up in flames in a backyard bonfire around 1983.”
Contributed photo
Top: Long-time newspaper man and islander Ted Grossman. Above left: The community tank painted with a goodbye message to Ted. Ted and Kay purchased the Waterville Empire Press in Waterville, Wash., where they lived for two years. Seeking a bigger challenge, they sold the paper and bought The Nyssa Gate City Journa in Nyssa, Ore. In 1985, they sold that paper and purchased The Islands’ Sounder, which brought
Nunez gets a one-year reprieve by CALI BAGBY Staff reporter
After much community support and letters from Congress to the Secretary of Homeland Security, Benjamin Nunez Marquez has received some good news. Marquez, known on Orcas as Nunez, has been granted a stay of deportation for another year by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement until May 6, 2015. For nearly 15 years, Nunez, pictured at left, has worked as a sawyer for Jack and Jan Helsell of Westsound Lumber Company on the island. In 2008, while taking his ailing 80-year-old neighbor Natalie White to the hospital in Anacortes, Nunez was picked up by Customs and Border Patrol. Lacking proper immigration documentation, he was ordered to be deported. After receiving a year-long stay last year, the Helsells applied for another stay this spring. Over the last several years, Jack and Jan
hired lawyers and applied for temporary yearlong extensions on the deportation so that they could find someone to fill his position at the mill. But the Helsells have yet to find a replacement. “He’s an important part of the business – we would be struggling to exist without him,” said Pete Helsell, Jack’s nephew who helps to operate the mill. Jack, Jan and Pete plan on continuing to find a way for Nunez to stay on the island. “We are still working on a permanent solution,” said Jack. “We haven’t given up. The stay gives us another year to hopefully figure it out.”
The next step According to Senator Kevin Ranker, D-Orcas, the stay of deportation is just one step in a long journey. “We’re not done yet,” said Ranker. “We’re
SEE NUNEZ, PAGE 7
the family to Orcas Island. In 1994, Ted and Kay sold the paper to Sound Publishing, and Ted remained on as editor until his retirement in 2006. “Anything to do with kids was particularly important to him,” said Van den Bosch, who worked with Ted for 15 years. “Although
SEE TED, PAGE 6
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