Community Corner

Until We Meet Again ...

Tuesday is my last with Patch.com.

By Saul Daniels

Not everything turns out the way we plan.

For instance, the supermarket where I worked as a teen, and where I dropped a case of mayonnaise in glass bottles, is long gone. So is the upscale department store where I sold sterling silverware to the likes of comedienne Totie Fields

I was a copy boy at the New York Times where I once shut down the composing room by accidentally crossing from editorial union territory into compositor union territory. The Times newsroom is now a bowling alley. The Old Gray Lady has moved elsewhere.

My college newsroom has been absorbed into space used for a museum. 

The tabloid paper where I worked in Upstate New York has vanished into it's broadsheet competition.

My newsroom at the Miami Herald, with the breathtaking view of Biscayne Bay, is rubble, awaiting construction of bayside condos, hotels and perhaps a Vegas-style casino. The paper, well it moved inland into a former warehouse under the glide path for Miami International Airport.

My desk at the Orlando Sentinel -- who knows what became of that as the parent Tribune Co. played fiscal games.

And then there's the Los Angeles Herald Examiner where, among more serious editorial-type things, I got to announce over the P.A. system on a regular basis: "The computer system is going down. Save your stories. Dive, dive, dive!" The Mission Revival and Spanish Colonial Revival-style building designed by Julia Morgan now serves as a movie set. The paper? Long gone.

In New Jersey where I launched a Sunday newspaper for the Gannett company is now a Kia car dealership. The building is long gone.

In Chatsworth, we could look out the windows of the not yet bankrupt Los Angeles Times newsroom on Prairie Street and watch movies at what was once the Winnetka Drive-In. The building is now occupied by the toy company that makes Bratz dolls. The surrounding strawberry fields are long gone.

And as you may have noticed in recent months, even Patch is retrenching. And although Tuesday is my last day with the company, the evolving sites in Southern California will continue to operate. During nearly three years I launched, nurtured, and promoted Chatsworth Patch as it became Northridge-Chatsworth Patch. Then I accepted an assignment as Field Editor and also managed the Encino-Tarzana Patch and Woodland Hills Patch sites. That ends Tuesday.

I want thank my loyal readers for their news tips, photographs, and even community-written stories. And I offer a hat tip to the freelance reporters, photographers, and videographers for their work through our months of tremendous growth. Thank you to AOL and Patch Media for the opportunity granted this bearded fellow to participate in this start-up experiment.

But after Tuesday, Arin Mikalian will continue to serve Northridge-Chatsworth Patch, and Craig Clough will be managing Encino-Tarzana Patch and Woodland Hills Patch

As I develop a new online home, you can email me at MyChatsworth@gmail.com or visit https://www.facebook.com/MyChatsworth.

As they say, see you in the funny papers.




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