The Ladner Optimist - reporter etc.

Friends in Ontario called me an optimist for heading west without a job and only a few hundred dollars in my pocket.

Little did they know my first reporting job in British Columbia would be at the Optimist, a small weekly newspaper in Ladner, located in the Municipality of Delta.

The night before my interview with owners Edgar Dunning and Ernest Bexley, I drove to Ladner to check out the town and the newspaper. Someone in the newsroom waved at me through the window. Everything felt like a job in Ladner was in the cards.

During the interview, Bexley was most interested in whether there was anything in my life that would cut short my stay at the Optimist. They probably had seen a lot of young reporters come and go. Assured him that after sleeping in my car and eating once a day, I would be grateful for the job and would be around for awhile.

Didn't ask what the job paid because money wasn't a factor for me when applying for a job. Dunning seemed to appreciate that and my scrapbook from Ontario newspapers.

They hired me for the do-it-all job: reporter, photographer, columnist, sports writer, darkroom technician, driver to pick up the papers at a North Vancouver printing plant etc.

One of the first challenges as a new Optimist staffer was to learn how to spell Tsawwassen, a nearby scenic coastal village that was blossoming as a ferry port.

The second challenge, a week later, was to get my car back after a GMAC repo man seized it for $150 owing after tracking me from Sudbury. Michael Finlay, a reporter at the Vancouver Sun I barely knew, loaned me the $150. (Never bought another GM car.)

Within weeks of settling into the job, I was writing In Our Corner, a community tidbits column mostly fed by stories told around the tables in the local Ladner Hotel beer room.

Got a phone call one day from a reader, a guy named Doug. He wanted to know if the Optimist was interested in a sports comeback story. He was local, so we set up an interview at his house.

Walked into his modest house the next day and it was empty except for limited furniture and barbells and other weightlifting equipment. Not being sports-minded, had no idea I was about to interview Vancouver-born Doug Hepburn, once considered the world's strongest man.

Hepburn, the first man to bench press 400, 450 and 500 pounds and peaked at 560, had wins in the 1947 U.S. Open, 1953 World Weightlifting Championships and the 1954 British Empire Games under his belt. He had also dabbled in wrestling and singing.

In early 1969, he was living an obscure life in Ladner. He was humble, even apologetic for calling the Optimist for news coverage, but he was keen on making a comeback.

The Optimist had an exclusive in publishing the story and a photo of Hepburn lifting weights in his living room. There was a book there, but I didn't have the experience to write it.

The Vancouver papers and Canadian Press, a national wire service, picked up the story and Hepburn was back in the news. Several books on his life were later published and he asked one author if he thought anyone would be interested in his story.

Canadians were still reading about Hepburn's Herculean achievements when he died in 2000.

While sitting in the Ladner Hotel one evening, a regular sat down at my table and tried to sell me on a new method of paying for merchandise. Something called ChargeEx and he was seeking new customers on commission. Told him the idea wouldn't fly because not all stores would accept the card. And what about those interest rates?

Don't know how the sales rep did, but ChargeEx and all of the cards to follow hit the jackpot.

The Ladner Hotel was a haven for local news stories but one story of world interest was the first moon walk on July 20, 1969. It was late in the evening in Ladner and the television was on, but most patrons were not watching the TV.

Being a news guy, just had to walk up to the bar, grab the house microphone and announce to everyone that Apollo 11's Neil Armstrong was about to take his first step on the moon. The noise diminished for a few minutes as folks looked up at the TV. Then it was back to drinking.

Of all of the Optimist assignments, one most complexing involved a public meeting where, in a heated debate, my co-boss Bexley scuffled with someone. Being a small town newspaper, wondered if they would publish my report of the disturbance, which I witnessed. To their credit, and my admiration, they published the story verbatim.

Ladner, where I spent my first Christmas away from home (1968), got me back on my feet thanks to Dunning - who turned 95 in January, 2005 - and Bexley. Met a lot of interesting people and learned a lot about British Columbia geography, including access to Point Roberts, Wa., being the only piece of U.S. land other than Alaska that is accessible only through Canada.

But another weekly newspaper in nearby Richmond, and the tabloid style of its Michael "Mickey" Carlton, had caught my eye. After nine months with the Optimist, it was time to move on to the Richmond Review - as a photographer.

Next blog: Richmond Review - photographer