If you have never been to the Lincoln County Publishing Co. offices in Newcastle, let me try to tell you, in too few words, what you’re missing.
The office is enormous, a corrugated steel warehouse on the edge of the Great Salt Bay marsh. It is labyrinthine, with more rooms than I have been in myself even over the course of the past two years. This includes the front office, full of kind faces and, if you’re lucky, fun-size candy bars; the bindery and the press floor, where ink-stained people work determinedly alongside (and sometimes on top of) the 15-or-more-feet-tall whirring mechanical beast that prints our papers; and the layout room, where stories from across Lincoln County find their forever homes on the page.
There is also the editorial suite, where for the past two years I have typed away to contribute stories to The Lincoln County News.
This morning, though, my desk is quiet. This edition will be the last in which I am a staff writer. I feel so lucky to have inhabited this building for a short while, and even luckier to have shared that time and this space with the entire LCPC team. I have learned so much from everyone here, including my fellow reporters, the editorial team, and the kind, industrious members of the Roberts family, who I will always be grateful to for trusting me enough to add my name to the archives of their one-of-a-kind newspaper.
I knew when I started that LCN was a community institution, but I could never have foreseen how patient, kind, and welcoming this county would be to me as I got my footing as a reporter. I’m more grateful than I can say to every citizen, town employee, teacher, farmer, and everyone else who welcomed me into their homes and workplaces, answered my questions, and made me feel at home. I will have a lot to miss.
