Minnesota weekly newspapers seek to survive

It has been more than two months now since two weekly newspapers in rural Minnesota made the national news by initiating a GoFundMe campaign to try to raise enough money to keep the lights on and the presses running.

The announced goal on April 29 was to amass $50,000. As of June 30, just 22 people had stepped up to make contributions totaling $1,740. Sadly, the campaign is not off to a stellar start. A single contribution of $1,000 in the lone bright spot.

Rick Bussler is the owner and publisher of the Dodge County Independent, based in Kasson, Minn., a city with about 6,000 inhabitants, and the Steele County Times, based in Blooming Prairie, Minn., which has about 2,000 residents. Combined, the two papers have a circulation of about 3,600. (Dodge and Steele counties are adjoining counties in southeastern Minnesota.)

Bussler’s GoFundMe plea is titled “Journalism Matters: Now More Than Ever.” The text begins: “It’s another small-town graduation day. Seniors are dressed in their caps and gowns, the valedictorian and salutatorian are getting ready to give their big speeches, and a student who struggled for 13 years of school is about to cross the stage.”

“With all this going on there’s something missing, though. There’s no one there taking photos for the local newspaper…documenting the biggest day of many kids’ lives. Why? Because the local newspaper that the town knew for more than 100 years no longer exists.”

The appeal continued: “Our goal through our GoFundMe campaign is to bring awareness to people that local newspapers, like ours, are…important to the lives of the local communities and that newspapers are keepsakes and are our history for generations to come.”

Mary Lynn Smith of the Star-Tribune, published in Minneapolis, covered the GoFundMe launch and interviewed Annie Anderson, advertising director at the Independent. She said: “Small-town papers keep people engaged in the schools, sports and local events and ensure that city and county officials are held accountable. If the community wants a newspaper, they need to step it up and be part of the solution.”

Linda Ha, reporting for KTTC, a television station based in Rochester, Minn., interviewed Bussler, who said on camera: “We are struggling. We are on life support.”

Bussler told Ha that several factors are at play, including the rising cost of newsprint, a decline in advertising sales and smaller subscription bases. “We’re down to a skeleton crew already,” Bussler said, “and it’s tough to keep going.”

Dagnabbit all. Is community journalism on its last leg?

That thought worries Hannah Yang, a reporter at the Austin (Minn.) Daily Herald. She reached out to Alex Malm, editor of the Independent. He’s also the chief reporter, the guy who covers city council and school board meetings in Kasson.

Malm told Yang that he “loves journalism and loves small towns.” She said Malm has “found the affinity of writing stories about the people around him.”

“This newspaper means a lot to me,” Malm said, “and the community means a lot to me, too. Who is going to cover this stuff if the newspaper is gone?” Yes, who indeed?

Yang has her own opinions on this subject of community journalism, and she shares them willingly with her readers. “Losing a community newspaper has its effects in the towns it serves,” Yang commented. “Studies also indicate that a lack of local media coverage is associated with less informed voters, lower voter turnouts and less engaged local politicians.”

“We know that the people we write about are our neighbors, business partners and friends. We are members of the community, too. We care about the successes and hardships that people experience. Their voices deserve to be heard, and we’re usually the first ones there to share their stories.”

“That’s something that small town newspapers have that bigger news outlets cannot replicate from a distance, because they don’t know the full scope of the community the way small newspapers do.”

Yang suggested: “If our newspaper were to disappear, where will you go for the most accurate, important source of news specifically catered to Austin and surrounding towns? Would you wait for a larger news outlet to come by and maybe report on a story that the Austin Daily Herald could’ve had within a day or two?”

“You may be left waiting. Many larger news organizations depend on smaller newspapers for coverage ideas. If we’re gone, it’s almost certain no one will know what’s happening in Austin. No one will hear about the everyday amazing things that happen here, rather only about something bad that may happen on occasion, if it’s big enough to catch the attention of a big news outlet. You deserve accurate representation of the community you live in by the reporters who are based in your town.”

“I implore you,” Yang wrote, “please do not take for granted the valuable resource you have in Austin. There are so many stories in Austin and surrounding communities happening, and you, as readers, deserve to have those told and shared.”

“Until then, expect us working in the newsroom and continuing to put out the best paper we can every single day. That’s no exaggeration. That’s a fact.”

Have you been noticing and counting the parallels? The very fabric of our lives would be so very weirdly different if we were left “news-less at the Crystal Coast” in Carteret County, North Carolina, U.S.A.

Glass Wax vanishes while Mr. Bubble carries on

Dagnabbit: You might be an old fogey if you still have Gold Seal Glass Wax in the classic pink can tucked away on some forgotten shelf or in a neglected storage compartment.

Loyal Glass Wax fans insist that no product ever invented has done a better job of cleaning glass and mirrors, silverware, metal appliances or chrome automobile bumpers.

Do you recall the print advertisements of the early 1950s that featured “Goldie,” the Gold Seal seal? She wore the Gold Seal medallion around her neck, and said: “Sponge it on, wipe it off; it’s quick and easy.”

Cleaning windows became a breeze. Just a few dribbles of the pink goop applied to a damp sponge could cover a lot of glass. When it dried to a white haze, simply swoosh it off with a dry cloth and magically, the window pane was left sparkling clean.

The Glass Wax product was introduced to the public by Harold Schafer of Bismarck, N.D., owner of Gold Seal Products Co., a floor wax business he started in 1942. Tom Hintgen, a columnist with The Daily Journal of Fergus Falls, Minn., wrote that Schafer was attending a conference in Minneapolis in 1945 where he learned about “an emulsion that was used in World War II to clean aircraft windshields.”

The next morning, Hintgen reported, Schafer “ordered two boxcars of the emulsion. It came in three colors – pink, blue and green. Schafer picked pink.” Schafer’s Glass Wax was an instant success and went into national distribution in 1948.

Linda M. Young, author of HolidayHarbour blog, may have started the conversation about “whatever happened to good old Glass Wax?” In one of her essays, she reminisced about past Christmas seasons when Glass Wax offered sets of holiday stencils to make “window wonderland” images as decorations. The 59-cent stencil packets contained 34 designs.

Dave Jacobs responded online to Young, adding a bit of Gold Seal history. He said the “phenomenal success of Glass Wax was repeated again” by Gold Seal in the 1950s with the introduction of Snowy Bleach and in 1961 with the rollout of Mr. Bubble.

Glass Wax, Snowy Bleach and Mr. Bubble each rose to become the top product in the world in their respective categories, Jacobs reported.

Gold Seal scored a marketing trifecta. Randy Hoffman, author of the BisManCafe blog, specializes in Bismarck history. He wrote: “At its height, Gold Seal had annual revenues of $50 million, positioning it as the largest privately held business based in North Dakota.”

The Gold Seal family business was sold to Airwick Industries of Wayne, N.J., in 1986. Soon thereafter, Airwick was acquired by a British company, Reckitt & Colman. The business eventually morphed into the Reckitt Benckiser Group (RBG) in 1999. RBG silently discontinued production of Glass Wax in 2002.

Jacobs said he figures Reckitt Benckiser deep-sixed Glass Wax without a proper burial because the product contained petroleum distillates. The Glass Wax containers were imprinted with messages that cautioned consumers that contents are “harmful or fatal if swallowed.”

“Even so, I can’t imagine anyone with half an ounce of common sense who would ever have a problem in using the product,” Jacobs commented.

The Schafer family’s Gold Seal legacy, however, continues to live on through the popularity of Mr. Bubble. The product was launched in 1961. Very rapidly, Mr. Bubble became a favorite bath-time tub buddy in millions of American homes.

Mr. Bubble promised to “bubble kids clean and leave no bathtub ring.” The tagline was: “Mr. Bubble makes getting clean almost as much fun as getting dirty. Kids come out so clean, their own mothers don’t recognize them.”

Since 2008, the Mr. Bubble brand has lived on as a member of the family of personal care products owned by The Village Company (TVC) of Chaska, Minn., a privately held enterprise. Its headquarters is about 25 miles southwest of Minneapolis.

On Mr. Bubble’s 50th birthday in 2011, the character was updated in an attempt to become “more animated and appealing to today’s kids, while still maintaining the nostalgia that parents know and love,” wrote Lisa McTigue Price for Packaging Digest magazine. “A dramatic change from the original pink bubble with white outlines, the new Mr. Bubble was created with brighter pinks and deeper dimensions.”

The “refreshed” Mr. Bubble seems to be quite content at TVC, complementing the diversified Sesame Street brand of children’s personal care products. Imagine how much fun you can have in the tub with Cookie Monster, Elmo and Big Bird all joining Mr. Bubble. “Rub-a-Dub-Dub.”

Community newspapers are making their own news

Hail to the Hillsboro (N.D.) Banner, the oldest weekly newspaper in present-day North Dakota. The Banner was founded 140 years ago in 1879 – 10 years before the Dakota Territory was split to form the states of North Dakota and South Dakota in 1889.

This bit of trivia was shared May 28, 2019, with readers of a regular column titled “Neighbors,” which is written for Forum Communications, a family-owned media company based in Fargo, N.D. Its author is Bob Lind, a leading advocate for community journalism. Lind has worked in the newspaper business ever since graduating from the University of Minnesota in 1957.

Lind complimented his longtime friend Neil O. Nelson, former publisher of the Banner, by reprinting one of his final editorials that appeared earlier this year.

Nelson boasted with pride that the Banner “never missed a publication date and remains not only in business after 140 years but is also recognized as one of the better papers in the state.” That attests to “the lasting viability and vitality of the paper and its communities.”

(Hillsboro has a population of 1,610 and is the county seat of Traill County, located on the Interstate 29 corridor about 40 miles north of Fargo near the Red River of the North, the boundary between North Dakota and Minnesota. The Banner has a circulation of about 1,150.)

“…Demands put on newspapers today are no less challenging than they were 60 or 100 years ago, when a printer’s hands were mired in black ink, burned by hot lead and callused by the task of handling tons of newspapers,” Nelson wrote. “Back shops in those times were distressingly warm in the summer and uncomfortably cold in the winter.”

“The elements today we can handle; the challenges offered by the advent of new-age technology and the people’s insatiable thirst for on-demand news and information have newspapers scrambling to keep pace in today’s ever-changing world.”

“Hardly a surprise but no less distressing, advertising profits realized are the subject of diminishing returns; for the small-town business owner, the demand for his and her advertising dollar is unending. Yet businesses continue to support their hometown newspapers, and for that…the newspaper industry…is forever grateful.”

Nelson continued: “As a community newspaper, we are sensitive to our many readers and what they expect to find in their hometown newspaper. We take great pride in delivering a quality newspaper; we are guided by the public’s trust that what we do, we do with their best interests at heart.”

Bob Lind was one of the old-timers interviewed for an oral history project sponsored by the North Dakota Newspaper Association, and he commented about the importance of community newspapers as it relates to local government. “People run a democracy, but you can’t do it unless you know what’s going on,” Lind replied. (Dagnabbit, that’s good stuff.)

The truth of the matter is: The Bismarck Tribune, as North Dakota’s leading and state capital newspaper, is not going to be sending a reporter to cover the regular meetings of the municipalities, school boards or planning commissions within Traill County. Neither the Tribune sports desk nor ESPN is going to be covering the athletic contests that involve the mighty Burros of Hillsboro High School.

Hannah Yang worries about such things. She is a reporter at the Austin (Minn.) Daily Herald, which is published Tuesday through Saturday and has a circulation of 5,280. (The community has a population of about 25,000 and is the county seat of Mower County, located just above Iowa on the Interstate 90 corridor.)

Yang’s column on May 29, 2019, provided an insightful look into the current state of affairs relating to community newspapers. She wrote:

“For more than a century, the Austin Daily Herald has been your beacon as a source of news and information. This is the place where you go to learn more about the stories that matter to your community. Yet, I feel as if local journalism has been taken for granted, and that many have forgotten what an essential role and service community newspapers provide for their town.”

She noted that adjoining Dodge County lost two of its local newspapers in 2018, “leaving a hole in coverage for specific communities in the area. Eventually, many towns may become ‘news deserts,’ communities that will not have consistent local news coverage.”

Yang commented: “The Associated Press recently released a data analysis compiled by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill that showed more than 1,400 towns and cities in the country lost a newspaper over the past 15 years.”

“Losing a reliable local news source will affect the community, including the inability to serve as a watchdog for government agencies and elected officials,” she wrote. The esteemed Columbia Journalism Review agrees with Yang and Lind: “If local newspapers were to die, then voter engagement will decrease, and the community will become apathetic to its own democracy.”

Yang’s passionate appeal is: “The country deserves to have vibrant, strong newsrooms that are dedicated to telling stories in their communities accurately and efficiently.”

“Larger news organizations won’t be writing about accomplishments that your child achieved in high school or do features on someone retiring from a business after working there” for umpteen years.

Tourism leaders might consider recruiting leprechauns

It’s good to learn that tourism officials along North Carolina’s Crystal Coast are charging ahead with an ambitious marketing plan for 2019. It takes courage and faith to forge ahead to bounce back from Hurricane Florence, while clouds of economic uncertainty still loom.

Carteret County News-Times staff writer Elise Clouser reported in the May 15 edition that Carteret County’s tourism leaders are fairly optimistic that the 2019 summer season will yield decent returns. Let’s have faith that they’re on target.

No doubt, Florence (the monster storm of September 2018) had devastating and long-lasting effects on the hospitality industry in Carteret County. As we enter the peak of the 2019 tourism season, all is not back to normal.

The inventory of lodging accommodations is below normal. Several hotels are still under repair. Many vacation rental cottages suffered extensive damage as well. Several condominium complexes on Bogue Banks are still in the restoration phase and units are currently uninhabitable.

New properties have become available, however, to help fill the void. Hence, the prediction for the summer season is somewhat positive, but clouded with “iffyness.”

We have to pray and hope for the best…and extend the “hand of hospitality” to our summer guests. Those among us who are limber mentally can help by bending over backward and doing backflips to impress our “summer company.”

Should we be inclined to tweak the marketing plan and think way outside the box, town leaders in Emerald Isle could roll out the green carpet. It would be a zany effort to recruit the world’s 236 surviving leprechauns to come to the Crystal Coast for summer vacation. Dagnabbit, wouldn’t that be one heck of a booster shot for local tourism?

Today, the leprechauns are regarded as an “endangered species,” residing underground in a cavern beneath Carlingford, County Louth, Ireland. As a rule, leprechauns try to avoid human contact. But, they’ve taken a shine to the world’s official “leprechaun whisperer” in Carlingford. He’s a bloke named Kevin Woods. The leprechauns have named him “McCoillte” (man of the forest).

He tells visitors that he was approached in 2002 by an elder leprechaun named Carraig, who shared that once upon a time, millions of leprechauns populated Ireland, but “they have been dying out because people stopped believing in them.”

Carraig told Woods that the leprechauns needed someone from humankind to protect them, otherwise they would die out altogether. Woods was selected by the leprechaun nation as the man for the job. He has taken it seriously.

He originated the Carlingford National Leprechaun Hunt as an annual event to enlist believers whose faith will help keep the leprechauns alive.

Irish travel writer Catherine Mack interviewed Woods and asked him to describe the leprechauns he has seen. He replied: “They are spirits who are about 18 inches tall, have top hats, green jackets and trousers. Their shoes always have gold buckles. They were cobblers because they spent so much time dancing, and so they wear out their shoes – which is why they became cobblers.”

Mack asked Woods if she might see them. “It’s up to you,” he answered, “if you have the gift. I am not sure whether you have the gift or not.’”

As a 75-year-old storyteller, Woods is fond of the tale about “the coach driver who would stop at a spot on a road in the middle of nowhere. When the tourists asked why, he’d tell them it was ‘to let the leprechauns cross.’”

Woods said that when he sits with the leprechauns, “I feel their happiness. I listen to their music and often dance with them in my heart.”

One supposes that malarkey and blarney are traits of a good “leprechaun whisperer”…as well as an Irish tourism promoter.

“The leprechauns are just as concerned about ‘Brexit’ as we are,” Woods said. (The term “Brexit” is short for “British exit,” meaning the United Kingdom’s decision to leave the European Union.)

Much of the discussion is focusing on the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland. The 310-mile border now has about 300 crossings. All are soft borders, with an absence of checkpoints. Hard borders with physical barriers would be more than a nuisance; they would form wedges affecting travel and tourism, commerce and friendship.

According to Woods, some of the leprechaun tunnels at Carlingford extend into Northern Ireland.

This is also a lifeline for the leprechauns to connect to their rowdy cousins, the clurichauns. The clurichans detest work, but they love to imbibe. They’re welcome to come to Emerald Isle, too. Clurichauns would fit in well here, where it’s possible to fish and party all day and all night.

Emerald Isle savors its connection to Ireland

Emerald Isle, N.C., has a bit of an Irish air and flair about it. The town strives to be clean and green. Green is a dominant color in the town’s official color scheme.

The town savors its Irish connection and celebrates St. Patrick’s Day every year in March with a whoppin’ big festival, the wearin’ o’ the green and other things allowed within the pub tent area.

The original Emerald Isle, of course, is the island of Ireland, co-occupied by the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The latter remains part of the United Kingdom.

Ireland’s nickname as the “Emerald Isle” comes from “the large amounts of greenness that are due to the moist air and temperate climate,” explains the Tourism Ireland organization.

It’s been said people have inhabited this Irish island for eons. Saint Patrick himself made his presence felt in 432 to convert the Irish people to Christianity. He is regarded as one of the patron saints of Ireland and the official national apostle of Ireland. St. Patrick used the Irish shamrock with its three leaflets to explain the Holy Trinity to the Celts and Druids – the unity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, a central concept of Christian beliefs.

In contrast, Emerald Isle, N.C., was not inhabited by white settlers until the 1900s. Former Emerald Isle Mayor Art Schools said the entire uninhabited, 13-mile stretch of Bogue Banks west of Salter Path became the property of John A. Royall of Boothbay, Maine.

“We know for certain Royall started to buy land on Bogue Banks in 1910, perhaps as an investment, health retreat, winter residence, or simply a good location for a hunting/fishing cabin,” commented Walt Zaenker, chair of the Pine Knoll Shores History Committee.

Mary Warshaw of Beaufort, an artist and historian, cited an article that appeared in a 1913 edition of the Potsdam (N.Y.) Courier that was written by Martin V.B. Ives, who was “on assignment” in Beaufort.

Ives described Royall as “a man of ample means.” He purchased the whole tract of land available on the western end of Bogue Banks, “neck and crop, and today, if the writer is any judge, he owns a paradise.” (One definition of the term “neck and crop” is to act briskly with completeness.) Royall, it seems, was quite adept at that maneuver.

Ives visited the Royall’s bungalow on Bogue Banks – “built without cutting away any more of its trees and native shrubbery than was strictly necessary.”

While touring the property, Ives wrote that he “viewed its hard, white shell-covered and wave-washed sand beach…breathed in old ocean’s nectar of the gods in great doses. As a lover of nature and woodman, I have never seen a more heart-lifting, getting-next-to-nature, making a man open his lungs to drink in deep draughts of health-giving ozone with the flavor of the pine, and a ‘thank-God-I-was-alive’ place.”

(Dagnabbit, those picturesque words form a moving testimony for Crystal Coast tourism.)

Schools said Royall sold his property to Henry K. Fort of Philadelphia in 1922. Fort drew up plans and specifications for a resort development (still on file at town hall). America’s Great Depression (1929-39) squashed those grandiose plans.

After Fort’s death in 1943, the property was inherited by his daughter, Anita Fort Maulik, also a Philadelphian. She sold timber rights to William Britton McLean (known as W.B.) in 1946. McLean and George Spell had a sawmill business in Red Springs in Robeson County.

McLean saw the potential to develop the island as a “seaside paradise,” but alone he couldn’t come up with the cash to meet Maulik’s asking price of $350,000. Spell agreed to chip in, as did other Red Springs’ investors J.A. “Bus” Singleton and Hiram Grantham, but still they were about $150,000 short.

Schools said Robert Holding, then president of First Citizens Bank of Smithfield, put down the rest of the cash needed in the names of his three sons, Frank, Lewis and Robert Jr. When the $350,000 sales transaction was completed in 1954, it was the largest land deal ever recorded in Carteret County.

Schools said McLean and Spell sought the advice of a land development consultant from Florida, who requested an airplane ride to survey the property.

As they flew over Bogue Banks, the consultant was impressed and inspired by what he saw – miles of lush forest, a solid green gem in the middle of a sea of sparking water – and said: “This place shall be known as Emerald Isle.” And so it was.

McLean, one supposes, had an opportunity to step forward to issue a veto. The Maclean clan is one of the oldest of all of Scotland’s highland clans and was famed as great warriors. Genealogists have identified 152 variations of the spelling. McLean is one of the most common.

“The Scots and the Irish have a huge amount of cultural similarity and find each other good company,” offered Kitty Murphy of Scotland. “We have a huge amount of cultural similarity and find we are more alike than we are different. Quite simply, we blend well.”

Jim Keogh of Ireland said the Scots and the Irish “both have a long history of whisky making and appreciating.” Niall MacDonagh of Ireland said: “If you cannot be Irish, the next best thing is being Scottish. We are first cousins.”

Sláinte! The Irish toast for “greetings, cheers and good health” is pronounced in Carteret County as “slawn-che.”

What makes ‘The Old North State’ unique?

Will a bill proposed in the North Carolina General Assembly to specify “The Old North State” as the official state nickname gain any traction?

North Carolina generally has two surviving nicknames that are regularly used – “The Old North State” and “The Tar Heel State.”

The older of the two is “The Old North State,” and this term is used in both the official state song and the official state toast. Could it be an open-and-shut case? You decide.

In 2015, Our State magazine featured an essay by Katie Quine. She framed the nickname question as a matter of love.

“When I think about my love for this state, my mind always trails to Charles Kuralt’s speech in 1993,” given at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to celebrate the institution’s 200th commencement ceremony.

Quine commented: “His entire cadence is beautiful, but it’s his opening 13 words that resound deepest within my heart, ‘What is it that binds us to this place as to no other?’”

Kuralt continued: “It is not the well or the bell or the stone walls. Or the crisp October nights or the memory of dogwoods blooming…our love for this place is based on the fact that it is, as it was meant to be, the University of the people.”

Quine opined: “I’d like to believe his words could be applied more generally to North Carolina as a whole.”

“Truly, what binds us to this place of the pine? What makes us want to call North Carolina home? In and of itself, tar isn’t beautiful, and it isn’t nice, but those who have it forever stuck to their heels sure are,” Quine wrote.

A compilation of accolades from various sources says being a Tar Heel embodies “discipline, courage, determination, gallantry, honor and commendation.”

Dr. Bill Ferris, a history professor at UNC-CH, said a modern-day interpretation of Tar Heel “is associated with being grounded and anchored in a powerful way to the land.”

That surely was the case with Charles Kuralt. He was born in Wilmington in 1934 and studied journalism at UNC-CH where he was editor of The Daily Tar Heel. Kuralt’s first professional job was with The Charlotte News, where he wrote an award-winning column called “Charles Kuralt’s People.” In 1957, at age 23, he became the youngest correspondent ever hired by CBS News.

He later introduced a good-news segment on The CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite. Called “On the Road,” the feature ran for more than 20 years. During that time, Kuralt and his crew wore out six campers, crisscrossing the country’s back roads and telling stories about ordinary Americans. He later anchored CBS News Sunday Morning before retiring in 1994.

Kuralt never lost touch with North Carolina. He wrote about the state in his book “North Carolina Is My Home,” and some of his best days were spent tucked away atop Grandfather Mountain in a two-room cabin owned by his dear friend Hugh Morton.

Morton’s getaway was known as Anvil Rock. The cabin “features a rough-hewn wooden ceiling, flagstone floor and a view of Linville Peak,” wrote Leigh Ann Henion for Our State. “It takes its name from the top-heavy boulder that makes up its far wall. In summer, the rock exudes coolness. In winter, it seeps warmth. Here, Charles Kuralt became grounded by stone and solitude.”

From this perch, Kurault would venture down into the nooks and crannies of western North Carolina’s mountains to visit with “the storytellers, moonshiners and wood-carvers. He heard from blacksmiths and wildcrafters. He scouted the northwest corner of the state for stories as he had once scoured the country,” Henion said. “Each evening, he returned to Anvil Rock to pen all he had heard.”

Kuralt loved his university. He once observed: “And so, in concentric circles, as if from a pebble tossed from a pool, the influence of the University of North Carolina moves outward to the farthest corners of our state, and far beyond its boundaries.”

But, dagnabbit, he was the most in love with the people of North Carolina! His concluding remarks to his audience at that 1993 address, were:

“Care about one another…my warmest wish for you is to be sensitive enough to feel supreme tenderness toward others, and that you be strong enough to show it. That is a commandment, by the way, and not from me. I believe it is also the highest expression of civilization.”

The General Assembly members…as well as all the rest of us…should take those 50 closing words to heart.

America celebrates 80 years of ‘School Bus Yellow’

Happy 80th anniversary to “School Bus Yellow,” which became the uniform color of America’s fleet of school buses in 1939.

Dr. Frank W. Cyr, an education professor at Teachers College, part of Columbia University in New York City, is widely regarded as the “Father of the Yellow School Bus.”

His grant-supported work ranks among the most important pieces of research in the history of academia.

The Rockefeller Foundation awarded Dr. Cyr $5,000 in 1937 ($87,400 in today’s inflation-adjusted economy) to go out and study ways to improve rural education and transportation. It proved to be an excellent and worthwhile investment.

Dr. Cyr found that children were riding to school in all kinds of vehicles, ranging from horse-drawn wheat wagons to trucks and buses of all different sizes and colors (one district, hoping to instill patriotism in the children, painted its buses red, white and blue).

Freelance writer Ryan Lee Price of Corona, Calif., dug deeper into Dr. Cyr’s findings related to the shortcomings of rural school transportation. He reported that Dr. Cyr said the situation was “terrible.”

In the late 1930s, each state had its own standards for school transportation vehicles, and “the manufacturers had to cope with the differing rules, requirements and tastes from 48 states. For every different color, the bus companies had to have different booths to spray-paint them,” Dr. Cyr said. This was a huge kink in the economies that could be achieved in “assembly line mass production.”

Dr. Cyr completed his analysis and organized a conference in 1939 on the Columbia University campus, drawing in school administrators and transportation officials from all 48 states as well as key stakeholders, such as specialists from the school bus manufacturing and paint companies, Price reported.

Delegates met for seven days and agreed on 44 school bus safety standards, including specifications regarding body length, ceiling height, aisle width, axles and brakes. The outcome was a 42-page pamphlet containing the nation’s first school bus safety standards.

The most significant development from the 1939 conference was an agreement concerning a uniform color for the school bus vehicles. Officially, the delegates settled on a hue that is now known as “National School Bus Glossy Yellow.”

The conference delegates described the tone as a “warm orangish-yellow,” not to be confused with a warmly yellowish-orange.

Color does matter, explained Jill Morton of Honolulu, a noted color psychologist and branding expert.

She says: “The yellow family of colors gets your attention faster than any other color. People notice yellow objects first.”

“Even when you are looking straight ahead, you can see a yellow object that is not in front of you ‘in the corners of your eyes’ much sooner than any other color, even red. Scientists say lateral peripheral vision for detecting yellows is 1.24 times greater than for red.”

The yellow family is also regarded as the easiest to see in the semi-darkness of early morning and late afternoon, the times of day when the school buses tended to be “out and about.”

In 1989, Columbia University celebrated the 50-year anniversary of Dr. Cyr’s contribution to the nation. Columbia’s President Philip Michael Timpane said the 1939 school bus conference was “truly a milestone event in the annals of American education.”

“It is hard to imagine today any area of education policy where you could gather any number of people in one room and cause such a national change to occur,” he said.

The “School Bus Yellow” paint color was incorporated in 1956 within the Federal Standard Color System, which essentially is the U.S. government’s official paint color palette. The color was labeled first as 13432 but later as 13415. (They look the same to my eye.)

The most comparable color to “School Bus Yellow” in the Pantone Matching System (PMS) for ink colors used in the graphics arts and printing industries is 123-C. Within the Hex Code system, key in ffd800, to see how “School Bus Yellow” looks to designers who work on the digital media and website design side.

Dagnabbit. Wouldn’t you know it? “School Bus Yellow” is included in the rainbow of colors offered in the bigger boxes of Crayola crayons.

William Cyr who, as a child, asked his father the professor, “If you’re the father of the yellow school bus, what does that make me?”

Dr. Cyr replied: “Whenever you see a school bus pass by, you could say, “There goes one of my brothers or sisters.”