por Marvin J. Ramirez
Dear readers, each year the story continues, and most of the time, without much time in front of me, I just add one more year to my anniversary editorials.
It was 18 years ago, when San Francisco and the Bay Area communities saw the first edition of The Reporter, as it was called then (see the image here).
It was all in English, and at that time it had not occurred to me yet, to produce a bilingual publication. However, because my journalist father didn’t speak English, he suggested that I should make it bilingual. Without telling me why, I kind of thought what was his reason: he wanted his elderly friends at Centro Latino – where he ate lunch and socialized everyday – and himself, be able to read his son’s journalistic work. He was very proud of me. Prior to that, when I went to pick up the first edition at the printer – on 16th Street, and was driving on route to SF State University to distribute the paper there, I stopped at the intersection of Mission and 26th streets’ traffic light. I saw a group of old friends standing at the door of Barnes Gómez’ Golden Gate Liquors.
There was Gómez and a few of his personal friends chatting, telling and hearing each other stories, as it was his personality. At that moment it occurred to me to give them a copy of the paper. I got out of the car and brought them a bundle of The Reporter, which, after doing so, I thought of it as a community newspaper. My first idea was to make it a campus paper. The first edition, as el diseño del periódico.
Me faltaban casi dos años para graduarme con el grado de Licenciado en Periodismo. En aquel momento vi un nuevo horizonte en mi vida. Desde entonces me entregué a mi nuevo proyecto, y commence a cubrir la crónica sobre la vida social y política de los latinos en los EE.UU. con mis propias limitaciones, por supuesto.
Quiero agradecer a cada uno de mis anunciantes por estar todavía con nosotros durante estos largos años. Unos han estado apoyando fi elmente este esfuerzo que es trabajo de amor al arte, sirviendo a todos ustedespor 18 largos años.
Cada año le pedimos afi liarse a nosotros a to dos nuestros lectores y comerciantes para colocar su tarjeta de presentación y un anuncio de su nego cio para congratular este esfuerzo y para mejorar nuestra labor y la calidad de la publicación. Y le pedimos otra vez ayudarnos a recoger más fondos que se necesitan para seguir sirviéndoles. Durante las próximas semanas estaremos promoviendo nuestras ediciones de 18vo Aniversario. Les estaremos tocando la puerta de su negocio. Espero que nos las abran. Un abrazo a todos, con amor.
