The Inside Veer

Thanksgiving
Robert Perea, The Fernley Reporter

On the calendar, Thanksgiving always falls on the fourth Thursday of November. But in the seasons of life, it never seems to come at the same time twice.

In my life, it’s come during the giddy early days of a new relationship, and it’s come during a devastating breakup. It’s come in times of prosperity, and in times of desperation. More than once, it’s come as I was mourning a death, and it’s come when I knew I was celebrating the day with someone for the last time.

No matter who you are or what you do, it’s the same for you, too.

For me, this Thanksgiving comes as we’re still in the early stages of this endeavor to print the Fernley Reporter, and these last five weeks have been among the busiest of my professional life. But I’ve always made a point to experience the journey as much as the destination, so while there is still much work to be done to make sure this paper reaches your hands on time, I want to pause for a moment and reflect on some of the people I am so grateful for this Thanksgiving.

I started the Fernley Reporter in 2016, but the seeds for the idea were planted years before while I was still working for the Reno-Gazette Journal as the reporter covering Lyon County for the Mason Valley News and Fernley Leader-Courier.

RGJ was an excellent metro newspaper, but there is a big difference between a weekly community newspaper and a metro daily. I have tremendous respect for almost everyone I worked with at RGJ, but so many of them didn’t grasp the difference. That was most evident when someone would call me wanting to place an obituary in the paper. More than once, after I referred someone to the RGJ obits department, I’d get a second call from the person complaining how much they were charged.

When my own dad died and I was given a free obituary, I received an invoice with the balance zeroed out. The price I would have had to pay had I not been an employee was nearly what it cost to have him cremated, and I decided right then that was no way for a community paper to operate.

When I decided to start the Fernley Reporter, the first person I consulted was Joey Crandall, who was doing exactly what I wanted to do as the publisher of the Carson Valley Times. Joey gave me tons of great advice, warned me of some pitfalls to avoid, and most importantly, he designed an awesome Fernley Reporter logo that I still use.

The name for The Fernley Reporter was inspired by my friend Charlie Ludlow. When I was considering different names for the website, he showed me some copies of the Santa Fe Reporter newspaper from when he was a staff writer there in the 1970s. That name immediately struck the right note, because, hey, nobody else is covering Fernley news. I am the Fernley reporter, thus, was born The Fernley Reporter.

My biggest supporter from the moment I started, in fact, even going back to my days at RGJ, has been Kelly Brye. Now that we’re printing the paper, Kelly has been our biggest advocate, delivering papers, promoting it on Facebook and helping coordinate so many logistical things. I have never been comfortable at all about promoting myself, but Kelly has been shouting from the metaphorical mountaintop. I seriously doubt we’d have received the enthusiastic support we have gotten so far without him.

There are so many things that need to be done to produce a newspaper, and there is no way I could be doing it without Rachel Dahl and her crew at the Fallon Post. They have had their own difficulties trying to stay afloat, so the fact they were even willing to help me is amazing.

Former Fernley mayor Roy Edgington has done so much for this community that only a few people even know about. I knew Roy a little bit during his time on the city council and as mayor, but it has been through the Fernley Rotary Club that I’ve gotten to know him better. Nobody embodies Rotary’s motto of “Service Above Self” more than Roy does.

Publishing The Fernley Reporter online for the past eight years, only a handful of stories have ever drawn more readership than Fernley High School sports consistently do. The staff at the high school has always accommodated anything I needed, whether for sports or anything else. Leadership advisor Jackie Kingston is always willing to provide a photo when I need one or identify people in a picture I have. Coach Chris Ward gave me more access to his program than any coach I have ever covered, and current coach Anfernee Sloan has continued that.

Most importantly, thank you to those of you who have already subscribed to the paper, bought an ad or plopped down a dollar to grab a copy at one of our pick-up locations. I hope this newspaper serves you individually as a reader and collectively as a community.

Happy Thanksgiving to each and every one of you.