The morgue is full of “dead” newspapers. Those dead newspaper issues go all the way back to the 1800s. They aren’t all issues of The SUN — there are also issues of other newspapers that documented the history of our community prior to The SUN.
These old newspapers are available for viewing at the Ruby M. Sisson Memorial Library, thanks to Friends of the Library, who had them digitized last year.
You have to look for the bound books from 1909 to find when Volume 1, Number 1 of The Pagosa Springs SUN was published.
And, if you turn to the front page of this week’s SUN, you will find Volume 107, Number 1.
The Volume indicates the number of consecutive years the newspaper has been published; the Number is the week during the year that issue is printed.
That’s a lot of years.
That’s a lot of history.
And, you can find that history often times repeating itself, in Shari Pierce’s Legacies column beneath this editorial on this page each week.
Since 1909, The SUN has been documenting the lives of Pagosans from birth announcements to their obituaries, the developments of town councils, county boards and school boards, our hometown school athletics and arts programs, along with the news and community events.
When you work at The SUN, you become aware that you are just another caretaker of this valuable institution. There have been other staff and owners before us, and there will be others after us. We are simply “custodians of a tradition.”
It is a tradition that The SUN staff members are proud to carry on.
As long as parents take pride in the birth of a baby, or graduation, or marriage, or any number of life’s milestones, people will enjoy reading about them in The SUN.
As long as people care about who died in our community this week, how high our taxes may rise or who scored the winning touchdown at the high school football game — The SUN will carry on the tradition of bringing the news of Pagosa Country to you.
As long as advertisers have a message to share and public notice information needs to be conveyed, The SUN will deliver those messages and notices to you.
As long as bulletin boards and refrigerator doors display cherished family memories, The SUN will proudly print those memories for you to hang up.
With today’s issue, we start our 107th year of newspapering in Archuleta County.
The SUN, with its print and online formats, continues to play a critical role in documenting the activities of our community.
It’s part of what makes living in a community so special. Everyone wants to have a sense of home, a community where they can be involved and where getting to know neighbors is a blessing, not something to be avoided.
It takes some effort to create a sense of community. It doesn’t happen without the investment of people who care. As we enter this 107th year of publication, Robert Penton, Shari Pierce, Mike Pierce, Randi Pierce, Missy Phelan, William Thomas, Ed Fincher, Renita Freeman, Shana Gawdun-Young and Terri House are proud of our efforts to inform and document the events of Archuleta County.
There is plenty to celebrate on our birthday.
Terri Lynn Oldham House
