City limits by Debbie Knox
By now, most of Pittsburg knows I submitted my letter of resignation last Tuesday. It was a difficult decision, but I am at peace. It was hard because I love this business. Thankfully, I have much to share, so here goes. Starting out in my mid-20s and being raised by a single mother and bossy sister five years my senior, I was pretty naïve about everything. We were relatively new in Pittsburg and I was so excited at the opportunity to work for Dick White who actually approached me to work for him. I was clueless about the business, except for the obvious, but loved it from the beginning. And I loved Dick and Jenny White; still do. I had the privilege of visiting with them at their new home in Austin last weekend. For those who never met Dick and Jenny, Dick is beyond patient and let’s just say Jenny is the opposite. It was the late 70s when I began, and nothing prepared me for the experiences I was about to have.
Thursdays people filed in and out of The Gazette like a carnival ride. You couldn’t buy a paper until Thursdays. I still am amazed at the anticipation of the hometown newspaper. The papers were there on Wednesday, but you couldn’t get one until Thursday. That changed when Jenny came to work at The Gazette. In all my newness, one Thursday I happened to wait on an older gentleman who had been in the office on Monday or Tuesday to place a lost dog ad. He had lost his brown Chihuahua. As he approached, I knew he wasn’t happy. With tears in his eyes, he slammed his hand down on the counter and said, “I don’t know how you did it, but you did. How in the hell do you get brown cat out of Chihuahua?” All I could think of when I was racing through the original copy folder with my hands shaking was …’I’m glad this isn’t me.” Apparently when the typist picked it up, it read “c.” because the employee didn’t know how to spell Chihuahua and the typist put cat instead. Folks, that man never found his dog; and he blamed us and reminded us every single year when he renewed his subscription. And, I guess, we deserved it. When The Gazette carried office supplies, a man came through the back door every spring announcing, “I can’t hear a thing; I can’t hear a thing.” He was dressed in overalls with a straw hat; walked fast and was so loud that I really didn’t know what to expect.
