Fenton Rotary Club Meeting

Craig Rockman, the Publisher of the Tri-County
Times was the guest speaker at the Fenton Rotary Club at its weekly meeting at Spring
Meadows Country Club on October 22nd.  Craig gave some background and history on the
Tri-County Times, which was interesting. 
His father started the Tri-County Times in 1955 in Fenton.  The Rockman family continued running the
newspaper through a management company for a period of approximately 5
years.  During that time the quality and
distribution of the paper went downhill. 
The Rockmans brought the paper back in 1994 when they retook ownership.

Craig did some “homework” on Rotary
International.  Craig complimented Rotary
on its worldwide project, which is eradicating Polio.  He thought that was a very noble project and
was a great contribution to worldwide society.

Craig then went into the “state of the
newspaper industry”.  Things have changed
substantially since Craig and his family have been in the newspaper
business.  Craig believes that the “downfall”
of the newspaper industry began on November 22, 1963 when President Kennedy was
assassinated and then Jack Ruby executed Lee Harvey Oswald on national TV.  TV became the premier provider of news events
to the “entertainment” public. 

Beginning 1996-1997 the newspaper industry
again went noticeably downhill.  Other sources
of the distribution of news were more than enough competition to force the
newspaper industry to its “knees”.

2007 was another “watershed” year of decline
for the newspaper industry.  News became
available on I-Phones and all kinds of other technical “toys” and devices.  These devices could be carried with a person
and can give us news as it is occurring.

As a result of this continued decline of the
industry, the industry has "consolidated”.  

The newspaper industry financially has lost a
huge amount of advertising income to the competing medium communications
sources.  One of the advantages to a
newspaper, especially a local or regional newspaper is that it does carry local
news, which most likely is not covered under national TV stations, even though
they have local affiliates.  In addition,
there are public interest stories on individuals within the community which
would not be carried on local TV news. 
The newspaper also covers activities at the schools, including their
sports activities, which again would not be covered by larger media
distribution sources.

The Tri-County has an Editor’s Board Meeting
every Monday where they outline the work for the week.  At this time they are working on the 50th
Anniversary of President Kennedy’s Assassination.

Sadly Craig indicated there is no “heir to the
throne”.  There are no up and coming
Rockmans that are interested in taking over the business, so there may be a
change of ownership and management sometime in the foreseeable future.  Craig loves his job serving the community.

It was announced that the next Board Meeting
will be at Bush Park, weather permitting. 
The next regularly scheduled Fenton Rotary Meeting is on October 29th
and will be a Business Meeting.