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How my punishments became my career

Daily deadlines are a way of life at a newspaper, and it can sometimes be nerve-racking trying to get a story just right as the seconds tick by. But, when I think about some of the hardest writing I’ve ever done, it didn’t involve coming back late from a basketball game, a football game, or a board meeting. No. The hardest stories to write came courtesy of my dad. I was a fairly good kid growing up, but I got into my fair share of trouble. I got a lot of the usual punishments, but my most frequent punishment involved writing an essay, assigned to me by dad, the conferrer of ...

‘This is who we are’ — Clint and Doug tie knot after 20 years

ALPENA — These two are anything but conventional. They’re gay, and they’ve been together for over 20 years prior to getting married at a historic church on the grounds of Besser Museum for Northeast Michigan. If you know Douglas Taratuta and Clint Taratuta-Kendziorski, you know ...

Going on a treasure hunt in the morgue

Tucked way in the back on the second floor of The News office is a gold mine with the most unassuming name. We call it the morgue. The name may sound haunting, but media morgues are actually pretty common. Traditional morgues consist of files filled with clippings that are organized by writer, subject, or even the name of a company. That allows morgues to be used for research, but makes it hard to locate clippings by date. At first glance, ours doesn’t look much like a gold mine. In fact, it looks like a storage room. That’s because it is. Outdated equipment is piled in boxes. ...

You don’t need a green thumb to enjoy gardening

If I have any color thumb, it’s purple. It’s definitely not green, much to my Opa’s chagrin. I’ve been using his old hoe to attempt to put a 4-foot-by-4-foot square vegetable garden in a sunny spot in our back yard. I have little to no idea what I’m doing. I mean, I know how to look ...

Mental health panelists: ‘It’s a big issue’

ALPENA — Alpena Public Schools hosted a May is Mental Health Awareness Month panel discussion and presentation on Tuesday, with many knowledgeable community partners weighing in on the issue of mental health. In addition to counselors from Alpena High School and Thunder Bay Junior High, ...