Missing the Sunday Paper

I recently started subscribing to my local newspaper, the Chattanooga Time Free Press. Until my retirement in 2022, I read several major daily newspapers most days in the office, and since then I’ve been reading most news online. But especially for a former newspaper reporter/photographer/editor like me, the attraction of a real newspaper is hard to resist. I missed having one.

It also helps that the Chattanooga newspaper has a good reputation, and that my friend and neighbor Dana Shavin is a columnist there. (You can find her at Dana Shavin, and she’s worth reading.)

Because I live outside town, I can’t actually receive a physical newspaper every day, but the Times Free Press gave me digital subscription and an iPad to read it on and delivers a printed newspaper on Sundays. At least that’s the plan. I’ve had the subscription for four weeks now and have only received the Sunday edition once.

I can still read the Sunday paper on the iPad, but there’s something special about having a real newspaper on Sundays. So this morning, I called the newspaper’s customer service line to report my missed delivery, and I mentioned the missed deliveries on previous Sundays. The woman I spoke with was friendly and seemed appropriately concerned, and she promised to alert the right people and to make sure today’s edition was delivered.

Making that call reminded me of one of my earlier newspaper jobs, back when I was in college. I worked part-time in the circulation department of the Chapel Hill Newspaper in Chapel Hill, NC, which in those days was an afternoon newspaper during the week (this was in the 1970s, when afternoon newspapers still existed) and a morning newspaper on Sundays. Each afternoon I’d drive a Ford Pinto load of about 350–360 newspapers around to addresses in western and southern Chapel Hill. Sunday morning circulation on my route was right about 400.

Those of us who worked in circulation also had the chance to pick up extra hours during the week, stuffing advertising inserts or perhaps helping with press runs on other products printed by the CHN. As a college student working part-time, I was eager for extra hours on the clock, so I’d happily accept the additional time when it was available.

That is, I’d usually accept the additional time. There was one job in circulation that nobody wanted. On Sunday mornings, carriers started making deliveries at about 4 a.m. and papers were supposed to be delivered to subscribers by 6 a.m. One of the carriers picked up extra hours each Sunday by staying in the office and handling complaint calls from subscribers who didn’t get a newspaper that day. You’d take calls until 9 a.m., then you’d drive around town and deliver newspapers to all those missed addresses.

Most days there weren’t that many, but if a new carrier had just started a route, or if a carrier had called in sick and a substitute had covered the route that morning, there would sometimes be a lot more addresses overlooked, and thus a lot more makeup deliveries.

The worst thing about making Sunday late deliveries was that many people were angry about not getting their papers. Our circulation manager told us that when delivering a missed paper, we should not toss it onto the sidewalk or into the driveway, but stop and ring the doorbell and deliver the newspaper face to face. This meant that you had a lot of encounters with irritated people who wanted to hold someone personally responsible for their missing newspaper. Explaining that you weren’t the carrier who typically handled that route wasn’t usually effective.

One Sunday when I was doing the late deliveries, an elderly woman insisted that she knew I was her regular carrier because she recognized me from delivering her newspaper every afternoon that week. She lived on a different route from mine and I’d never seen her before.

As you might imagine, the process of making Sunday late deliveries face to face was the theory, but not always the practice. It was much easier just to leave the paper at the house and not risk the wrath of an angry subscriber who wanted to yell at somebody. Because it wasn’t always easy to get someone to do the late Sunday route, the circulation manager would periodically remind carriers of the policy for in-person late deliveries, but he couldn’t actually enforce it.

One morning when I had volunteered to do the Sunday late route, I was in the office and got a call from the circulation manager:

“Mr. Campbell didn’t get a newspaper this morning. He’s not happy. I need you to stop whatever you’re doing and go deliver a paper to him right now.”

“Mr. Campbell” was Orville B. Campbell, the publisher of the Chapel Hill Newspaper, and a figure well known in the North Carolina publishing world. He was also well known among newspaper employees for his bad temper and unpleasant demeanor.

Driving out to his house, I wondered if I dared just leave the newspaper in his driveway. But I knew he must be familiar with the policy for in-person delivery of late newspapers — he had probably devised it — and I figured that if I just delivered his newspaper and left, he’d be more enraged and would call the circulation manager again. I resolved to ring his doorbell and suffer the consequences.

But when I arrived at his house, Mr. Campbell was already standing in his driveway, wearing a bathrobe and a tremendous scowl. I pulled the Pinto up beside him and rolled down the window.

“Good morning, Mr. Campbell,” I said. “Here’s your paper.”

He accepted the newspaper without comment. As I drove off down the street, I saw in the rear-view mirror that he was still standing in the driveway watching me.

I never did get my newspaper today. But instead of calling again, I think I’ll wait and see what happens next week. We all need a little grace when we make mistakes. Plus, this particular mistake gave me an idea for another essay. Life is good.

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