CARLTON FLETCHER: A brief glance back before moving forward

And I’m surfing on a wave of nostalgia for an age yet to come.

— Buzzcocks

As clearly as if it were yesterday, I remember as a 10-year-old in rural Irwin County running to the highway (319) — exactly a mile from our house — on Sundays to pick up the Sunday edition of The Albany Herald, where our delivery man left it.

I’d lug that paper back to the house, hurrying a bit more the closer I got to home, about to bust wanting to open the Sports pages to see if there was any news about my favorite team, the Atlanta Braves. After a quick run-through of the articles — and I’d make myself go through that act, savoring the anticipation — I’d anxiously turn to the section that carried the National League batting and pitching leaders. I’d go down the lines carefully, looking for any Brave who might be on the list.

So, yeah, if you’ll allow me a bit of nostalgia, the Sunday Albany Herald has always been special to me. Thus I’ll admit to a little sadness today as I help put the lid on what will be — at least for the foreseeable future — the last Sunday edition of The Herald.

Since the story that appeared on Page 1A of Thursday’s Herald announced the plans for this newspaper going forward, I’ve heard from readers — some outraged, some curious and others nostalgic, like me. The Sunday paper has long been a tradition in southwest Georgia, and that’s something that drove me each week as I worked with staff — here and with the talented design folks in Marietta — to make sure each issue was all it could be.

There are people, not unexpectedly, who are angry at the changes announced Thursday: the move to publications on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays only and, as I said, the discontinuation of the Sunday paper. But before I say my last goodbye to that piece of Albany history, I’d like to offer my take — as someone who loves this paper, not as any “shill for the new bosses” as some of you will no doubt think.

First of all, those of you who are talking about the “failure” of The Herald are way off base. As part of the Georgia (and, actually, National) Trust for Local News, the newspaper will be on as solid a footing as it’s been since well before COVID. The move to three days of publication is not a monetary decision, it as, as Publisher Scot Morrissey notes, a response to the shift in readers’ habits.

Without getting too deep into the weeds, The Herald will continue to sell ads and subscriptions (at a fair price), but it will also have the backing of the nonprofit (GTFLN), whose goal is to support local newspapers with tools of the trade so that they can better cover local happenings. Here in Albany, we are already seeking to fill five positions, including another reporter.

Another, well, I’ll call it a great thing, is that everything to do with the Herald — journalism-related and business-wise — will now be handled in-house. No more going through an agency miles and miles away whose personnel probably couldn’t find Albany on a map. Everything — circulation, classifieds, advertisements, news, sports — will be handled at our 306 W. Broad Ave. offices.

And, in addition to a new news reporter, old pro Joe Whitfield is going to be a full-time, in-house Sports Editor, and award-winning Outdoors writer Tom Seegmueller will be key to a weekly Outdoors page in the paper, as well as a slick Outdoors magazine that will be as nice as any in the Southeast and feature content from some of the best in the business.

There’s more — plenty more, including larger (size and content wise) papers — but space doesn’t allow me to go on. Just know that while I probably have a more vested interest in the Sunday Albany Herald than anyone else on this planet, my sadness of its demise is tempered by the exciting new Albany Herald under the Georgia Trust for Local News. No, that’s not toeing the company line. That’s the truth.