By Fred Steiner
(Photo accompanying this column shows Fred Steiner and Ryan Lowry cutting the Icon’s first anniversary cake in 2010.)

Thoughts on:
• how the Icons came to be,
• journalism in a small town,
• and a memo to Steve Stratton on retirement.

Here’s the thing:

You can earn a living working in your profession in a small, rural community. But, along the way, you can’t predict the encounters that hit like insects on a car window at 70 mph.

Want to know how the Icon was born?
The idea was simple.

Create a community news source available to everyone. Put another way, make it a rare medium that’s well done.

It must be website accessible and archived so anyone can view any of the posts at no charge.

(In 2009 newspapers frantically tried to figure out how to create the above.)

There was no owner’s manual  for this concept. So, I sat down with Ryan Lowry, then an ONU student. We put our heads together and figured it out a way to make it work.

Ryan had the technical know-how. I had the news background. Chalk it up to Swiss ingenuity. 

We invented the Icons.

There were several initial models for our idea. Should we…

1 - Make it available by subscription only
     (too labor intensive)
2 - Make it a non-profit 
     (no money in it for me)
3 - Sell ads and make it available by subscription only
     (still, too labor intensive)
4 - Sell ads and make it available to anyone at no charge.
     (A gamble, but let’s give it a try)

These decisions flew around like those insects hitting the car window.

Meanwhile, the site's premise remained:
• Its primary focus is local news, written in a professional journalistic style.
• It must be able to step aside from straight news and offer its own opinion, when if feels it is necessary to do so.
• It must develop a kinship with viewers allowing them to feel that they, too, are part of the Icon team.
• It must carry an element of humor, remind the community of its own history, celebrate community milestones, the people making those milestones, and provide a photographic and video presence of the community.
• It must provide a platform for affordably-priced advertising for any business – starting as low as one dollar a day.
• It must promote local advertisers and the idea to shop local.
•  It must try to provide the owner a way to make a living on all the above.

Oh, and then there’s the issue of what to call it.

I compiled a list of some of the most god-awful names you can imagine: The Blufftonian, for starters. History lost the other 30.

Next, I did what men aren’t taught to do. I read the names to my wife, Mary. After she picked herself off the floor laughing (actually snorting), I recall her response, something like, “You idiot. Call it the Icon.”

It was as if lightning had struck. That’s the short version…the rest is history.

The Bluffton Icon launched on Sept. 23, 2009, on our youngest daughter, Anne’s birthday, so we could remember the date.

The Ada Icon launched on the Ides of March 2012, so we could remember the date.

Both started with zero viewers. Today the combined Icons experience about 25,000 individual viewers in a 30-day period.

Why journalism?
By profession, I’m a journalist. After graduating from Bluffton High School in 1968 I attended Bluffton College my freshman year and lived at home – to save money.

I bought my first camera, a Mamiya Sekor DTL 500 (film camera) with a shutter speed up to 500th of a second. It came with a 50 mm lens, probably an f 3.2. Total cost around $500, maybe less. It was a gem. And expensive either way.

My original plan was to be a radio disc jockey and or/TV news commentator. I wanted to become the next Eric Sevareid. I had a low voice and lots of opinions.

When I transferred to BGSU as a sophomore I met 50 other guys with lower voices than mine and each had more opinions that I had.

The writing on the wall occurred in a 400-level English creative writing course. I wish I could remember the name of the grad student instructor. I owe her because her teaching instructions changed my writing life. The book we used was "Elements of Style," by William Strunk and E.B. White. You know E.B. as the author Charlette's Web.

I graduated from Bowling Green State University in 1972. My career includes editorship of the Pandora Times, Berne (Indiana) Daily Witness and Bluffton News, with side stints at CSS Publishing, Bluffton College, Goshen College and Big Brothers Big Sisters, prior to conceiving the Icons.

Journalism is a noble career, protected by the first amendment to the U.S. Constitution. A lot of people don’t understand that.

Those who don’t understand it think that anyone can write. They are somewhat correct. Writing is easy. Just stare at a blank computer screen until beads of blood form on your forehead.

But, they also think they know all the rules covering journalism better than I know them. They are somewhat incorrect. 

Sort of like, anyone can doctor, teach, farm, or be a plumber.

But, that’s okay because doctors, teachers, farmers and plumbers, like me, understand most non-thinkers think that they, too, can do those jobs. It’s a common mistake. And, sometime we forgive give them.

The late Charles Hilty inspired my own interest in journalism, specifically community journalism.

The idea of writing about town characters who thought they owned Main Street, and those on the other side of the Riley with letters behind their name, intrigued me. Really intrigued me.

I also like to watch town events unfold. And, I get leads on story ideas whenever I’m in the public domain. Especially at places like the farmers’ market, the sideline of a Bluffton High School football game and while sitting in a church pew.

I’d like to share a sampling of these experiences with you. Some are true.

• I once confronted a Lyndon Larouche supporter. He had a large poster of then-President Obama wearing a Hitler mustache. This guy was seated in front of the Bluffton post office. You probably remember this. He sought petitions for some off-the-wall cause.

It was my civic duty as a journalist to call this guy out by saying that Mr. Larouche was jailed due to tax fraud. His response was: “Martin Luther King was also jailed.” I told the guy to go to #%$$, and walked off.

• Everyone has great ideas for April Fool’s stories. Problems come with these great ideas conceived from the maddening crowd.

For example, a viewer suggested  I write that the village will allow residents to shoot Canada geese one day each year.

Can you envision that? Someone would probably end up shot and someone else would end up in court. Either one of the two scenarios would be me.

Parenthetically, I posted a photo of Canada geese swimming in the Buckeye. A viewer asked me how I knew they were Canadian.

Concerning police news
Very early in my journalist career a pizza shop that no longer exists experienced an employee slugfest. Probably over a girl.

• Here’ a paraphrase of the police report: Police broke up a fight between two employees. One bite off a portion of the other employee’s finger. After I read that report I stopped ordering pizza from that establishment.

• Can’t recall where I heard this one – probably in a church pew…way too interesting to forget, and I only believe the first part of the story. I heard that a Bluffton taxpayer, delinquent in paying village income tax, was arrested, taken to the Allen County pokey, strip searched and jailed for an entire weekend. That version claimed the taxes due was about 25 bucks.

• Another version, probably more accurate, stated papers were served to this individual after five certified letters were sent over a two-year period with no response from the taxpayer. And, the amount due was four figures, not two. Quite honestly I never followed up to see if there was really a pre-paid holiday weekend in a large building on Lima’s Main Street.

• I once took a photo of a 20-foot boa constrictor (a dead one) that two guys claimed was ready to  pounce on them while it was alive.

“We were down by the creek and heard a rustle in the bushes and this python appeared, so we shot it.” (Something to that affect).

The only reason I agreed to take the photo was because I worried they might take it to the Lima News where it would show up on the front page.

After posting it, just to ease my mind, I conferred with several wildlife officials. They assured me that these guys probably had the snake in their bathtub. It no doubt outgrew the tub, so they took nature into their own hands.

• A man demanded I write a column identifying, by name, the township snowplow crew who tore up his rural country fence during a heavy snowfall. I suggested, instead, that he take it up with the township trustees. His response: “So, they bought you off, too!” (Without a doubt.)

• I wrote a story about the public library and left off the letter “l.”  I think this increased patron visits the next week.

• I wrote a story about a chicken barbecue, but typed the word “children” in place of chicken. That brought the house down.

• I posted a story by an elementary student writing about his summer vacation on Mackinaw Island. The spell checker changed it to “Maniac” Island. Some vacation.

• Someone once suggested I interview a woman who had a newspaper obituary collection saved in wallpaper sample books going back to the 1930s. It wasn’t clear, which was more unusual, the collection or the wallpaper books. I politely declined.

• Another suggested I write an editorial demanding people who place large rocks at the corners of their property remove them. Safety hazard.

• And, another offered to write a story about a guy in town (no longer living) and name him because he was an extremely colorful character and he had a drinking problem. Turned that one down also.

• I wrote a story about a kid who went on a mission trip to Europe one summer. I asked him how much money he raised for the trip and printed the amount in the story. His parents called me. They chewed me out for listing the price of the trip. They thought it was nobody’s business.

• Later that summer I interviewed another youth who did the same thing. I was careful not to ask how much the trip cost. His parents called me and chewed me out for not mentioning how much the kid raised for the trip. They thought it was everyone’s business.

Sure, there’s lots more I could tell, and you’ll have to wait on the creation of my blog. It’s telling name is “Forever Bluffton.”

And, finally, a memo to Steve Stratton:
Steve, you win.

You win the Bluffton High School class of 1968 working full-time longevity award.

As of July 1, I’m out of the competition. That makes me runner-up, I think.

After scouring the class roll and I don’t see anyone but the two of us still in the running. Unless there’s a classmate we don’t know about. It’s possible Jerry Kloeppel is still a candidate. He has a trucking business and I see him drive through town frequently.

For a time several class members hung in there. But, one, by one, they, too, cashed in their time cards for Social Security checks.

I did hold out on cashing mine in until I was 70, but that doesn’t count in this contest.

I even conferred with some other class members. Everyone is retired and doing fun stuff. At least that’s what I hear. For example:

Rick Emmert cashed it in about two years ago. He’s now writing a book on Noh Theatre, touring the world and giving lectures on the art form.

Todd Gratz’s retirement interests involve an archeological dig in a Mesolithic site in the Orkney Islands. I heard the he’s going to be interviewed on the Today show, describing his finds.

Someone told me Jim Heiks is completing Charles Ives’s unfinished symphony.

Edie Scalf, writing under the pen name of Eudora Welty, is living off book royalties.

Apparently one member of our class is a successful day trader. Can’t recall who it is. Maybe Jim Henry.

There’s more on this list, but I don’t want you to feel too envious.

Anyway, when I realized these classmates were having so much fun in retirement, I just couldn’t wrap my arms around the Bluffton daily scene any longer.

 You know the scene. The one your dad and my dad drove into our heads:
• Work until after the sun goes down and then get ready for tomorrow.
• Get up. Work until the sun goes down and then get ready for tomorrow.
• Repeat until this begins sounding like a Jack Kerouac novel.

The way I look at it, depending upon one’s state of mind,  competing for the award is either a crazy thing or a really, really crazy thing. I can’t make up my mind which. But, our drums beat to that different tune.

For me, everything seemed to be going along fine until I had a Damascus Road experience on Grove Road. One day, earlier this spring I realized that I wanted to go out on my lawn in the middle of the afternoon and blow bubbles, but couldn’t because… you know, worked called.

It was a good run, and you deserve to uncork the bottle of G.H. Mumm champagne, extra dry – or is it actually a bottle of Mountain Dew –  set aside for the last full-time working class member.

You and I probably wouldn’t know the difference between a Mumm and a ‘Dew. Could it be that’s the reason we hung around so long?

Tell you what. I’ll just jump in and see if the water’s fine. I’ll let you know. You may be hearing from me. But, I know your answer, so I probably won’t bother to ring.

Your classmate and runner-up,
Fred Steiner, Bluffton HS class of 1968

•• Hey, and don’t forget to watch for my blog.

••• And, don’t forget to attend the Icon summer party on Thursday, July 8, between 5:30 and 7:30 p.m. at Greenhorn Restaurant, 112 Vine St.