What’s black, white and ‘read’ all over?

Things people used to believe. (Or still do.)

1) Bulls get angry when they see red. “That’s why they have the red capes, right?” Nope. According to American Science Guide, bulls – like other cattle – are red-green colorblind. What actually triggers their response is the movement of the cape. (And purple lingerie.)

2) Goldfish only have a three-second memory. Nope. Me for sure, but not goldfish, according to a number of studies. (How in the world did they study this? “Okay, what did you have for breakfast?” “Uh … flakes.” “Lunch?” “Uh … flakes.” “Dinner?” “Uh … flakes.” “Eureka!” (“Why’s he floating on the surface?” “Because you overfeed him, you numbskull!”)

3) We only use 10 percent of our brains. Me again. Guilty, but for the rest of you all, according to Scientific American and a bunch of other science-y folks, humans “use virtually every part of their brain” and most of the brain is “active all the time.” (Mine’s active, just maybe like a cat chasing a laser pointer.)

4) You need to drink at least eight glasses of water every day. I drink a lot of water (and chocolate chip mocha frappes from a certain well-known coffee place), but I can’t imagine. I would spend 99 percent of my day in the bathroom.

5) “Nobody reads newspapers anymore.” Okay. So, this is one our good folks in the advertising department come across sometimes when they’re out and about, just trying to do their job – make a living. 

Yeah. Well, look. We all know newspapers took a hit back when online newspapers became all the rage, but that’s simply not true. Lots of folks still read newspapers. (We’re working hard to get “everybody” to read newspapers. And we’re not taking no for an answer.) Evidence? Our subscriptions are evidence. (If they don’t get their paper delivered to their home, oh yeah, we find out real quick people read newspapers!) Our rack (newspaper boxes) sales are evidence. I also do the Union on base’s paper. Sometimes I fill up the racks for our delivery person. Sometimes I do that for back-to-back issues and when I filled a rack with one issue and go to fill it with another and there are no longer any of the previous papers in there, well, that’s evidence people are reading. There’s also the phone call: “I can’t believe you misspelled ‘onomatopoeia’! Who can’t spell ‘ominoustopicapeeya …’!” The bottom line is there is evidence.

Here’s the thing. Big picture so to speak. The National Trust for Local News – its good folks/leaders – believes in local news. (I’m fairly new but pretty sure I’m in step with the vision.) I mean really believes in local news and local newspapers. It has invested a lot of money and time and energy, et cetera, to ensure local newspapers not just survive, but thrive. At the same time, it hasn’t stopped believing in online news. There’s a reason we just stood up our new website (hhjonline.com) and new websites are in the works for all of its Georgia newspapers, as a minimum. Its not hard to see why. The two make up a wonderful compliment to each other. For example. Our sports editor, Clay Brown, spent the evening at the Perry Junior League one night a couple of weeks ago. He took a bunch of pictures. A bunch. Too many for just the newspaper. So, what did he do? He ran as many as he could in the newspaper and then posted a good number more on our website. He added “for more pictures visit our website” so people would know where to find them. Owen Jones, staff writer, did the same thing for a firefighter competition.

That’s a beautiful marriage, don’t you agree?

A couple of things and I’ll leave you good folks to be about the business of it. One, the internet is still not perfect. (Yeah. Yeah. I know. Neither are papers. Well … except for the Houston Home Journal.) Proof is in the fact when I first started thinking about this column, I thought: I wonder if there’s any data on the internet that shows the impact online newspapers have had on print ones and how that has progressed over the years? And guess what? I found one. The problem was, at some point and time I closed out my browser and couldn’t find the website again. I looked all through my history – clicked this link, that link and that link … What the heck? Where did it go? I tried duplicating my search “text”. Anything and everything I could think of. Nothing. I wasted – the right word – a good hour trying to find the website. (Somebody must have stole it.)

Here was the gist. You’ll just have to take my word for it. Yes. Newspapers took a big hit back in the day. And a big hit the year after and the year after that and … But then something started to happen. It was like watching Rocky. (You know, the first one. The good one.) No matter how hard newspapers got hit, they just refused to stay down. They were hit and hit and hit, upper-cutted, gut-checked, yet Apollo Creed just couldn’t knock him out. “You thought I was tough? This chump will kill you.” – Apollo Creed. From my memory (see: goldfish) it started out at like 47.5 percent 10-15 or so years ago and then by the time it got to 2023, it was down to like 37.4 percent. “We can try to understand, the New York Times’ effect on man … Staying alive! Staying alive!” – Bee Gees.

Then two is where would you like to read these headlines? WORLD WAR III (hopefully read “nowhere” is the answer, but just for effect). CANCER IS CURED! IT’S THE RAPTURE! Your local or national newspaper? Or your “itsy, bitsy, teenie, weenie, yellow, polka dot bikini” (- Brian Hyland) iPhone? Big newspaper or pint-sized computer? 

Further, where are you most likely going to find a picture of your child, children, your great grandchildren, playing ball, coloring crafts (in school), parents celebrating their golden anniversary, or graduating (see our graduation section coming up)? Traditionally, and we’re not planning on changing a beautiful tradition, right here! Right where you can cut it out for posterity. (I guess you could print it off the internet or cut it out of your phone/computer with a hacksaw.) 

Well, you can believe what you want to. You’ll get cramps if you go swimming right after you eat. Dogs only see in black and white. It takes seven years for your body to digest gum. You swallow eight spiders a year while sleeping. (I knew an old lady who swallowed a fly …) Touching a toad will give you warts. (That thing about kissing it to get a prince is true. You should try it.) Albert Einstein failed math class. The world is flat.

Believe what you will. We believe in newspapers. And we believe people still read newspapers. Uh … psst … Isn’t that what you’re doing right now?