Carrol Vertrees: Today’s newspapers look, feel different

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Carrol Vertrees

Updated: May 9, 2012 10:04AM

Many of today’s newspapers are shorter, narrower and leaner than they were in my working days, victims of the economic virus. To purists like me, that is sad.

Many of us would be better off if we were narrower and leaner. Many of us can blame only ourselves, not a recession, but that is another story.

I take a figurative nip when I see an ad on a paper’s front page — a worse intrusion than a political speech from the pulpit. But it is another sign of economic reality.

My friendly doctor asked me about the future of newspapers and I rambled on about shrinking readership that results in fewer ads, competition from TV and online news, too much twittering and other distractions. A cultural, generational change.

If my doctor rambled on in such an imprecise way in diagnosing a medical problem, I would never go back. But I am lucky. He knows what he is talking about.

When I was allegedly working, our newsroom was full, noisy, often smoky and fun. We even had a Society department. Imagine that. Mostly, we felt what we were doing was important, and it was. This paper is still important, and I am lucky to still be linked to it.

Maybe it is my age, but I imagine that sometimes the print size has shrunk. And I miss the weather stuff that has been shortened, a space saver, a newsprint saver.

This paper continues to have superb high school and college sports coverage, a staple that draws readers.

Years ago, even I was called on to cover some games, including a football fracas in Tolleston on a rainy Friday night. I don’t know much about football, but I got by, except that night when I checked my notes, a page from the third quarter was missing, left behind on the muddy field. In my astute cleverness, I wrote that “Not much happened in the third quarter.”

In my kid days, back in a less sophisticated world, I often walked down our sandy lane to the mailbox, an adventure. We had the Indianapolis News and the Washington Democrat, which had a sports column labeled Basket Bawls that included a drawing of a crying baby. Clever, right? Those papers are gone.

I miss the comic strips. In my day, they were the Funny Papers. Maybe it is just my problem, but some of today’s comics aren’t very funny.

My favorites included the “Katzenjammer Kids,” “Maggie and Jiggs,” “Little Orphan Annie,” “Mutt and Jeff.” (I related to the short one, Jeff, I think.)

Later, in another farmhouse, our mail was delivered by Loren Cox, who stirred up the gravel road dust in his Studebaker Champion. His most important delivery was newspapers.

The papers were wider than my arm spread, so I had to lay them on the living room floor to get them open. That was fun. Mostly I read sports and the comics, while the real world went on without me.

I don’t know how many papers will survive, or how they will adjust, but I hope they don’t get any smaller.

I am a lucky newspaper man, working before some wonderful technology and cultural changes eliminated a lot of the noisy fun.

Does anybody know where “Mutt and Jeff” went?