Celebrating the Whitmores' successes - From the Cluttered Desk with Keith Roulston
BY KEITH ROULSTON
I was saddened, but not surprised, when I read the story in The Citizen a couple of weeks ago that Ken Whitmore was selling Blyth Printing to long-time employee Steve Dawe. Even though I knew it was coming, it was sad to see one of the oldest businesses in Blyth no longer under the Whitmore name.
I first met Ken when he was about four years old when his parents, Doug and Lorna, came to Jill’s and my house for dinner when we bought The Blyth Standard in 1971. It was a time of change in the business. The coming of offset printing to the newspaper industry meant that newspapers were being printed in an hour in a centralized plant instead of half a week on the two-page letter-press printing machines owned by most publishers.
Given the changing technology, many publishers were selling their newspapers to centralized printers like the Goderich Signal-Star. Instead, we bought The Blyth Standard (I was editor of the Clinton News-Record at the time) from the Whitmores. With little space available on main street, we published the paper at first from the house beside Bainton Limited. Lorna Whitmore helped us out at first because I continued to edit the News-Record during the day and worked on The Standard nights and weekends for several months.
Later on, after I became enraptured by professional theatre at the Blyth Festival, I sold The Standard to A. Y. McLean, publisher of The Huron Expositor (who also owned The Brussels Post and had bought The Rural Voice from us.) Andy was trying to assemble a viable business for his daughter, but when it became obvious she wasn’t interested, he sold off The Expositor, The Post and The Standard to Signal-Star, who included The Post as a single page in The Expositor and The Standard as a single page in The News-Record. The Rural Voice he sold, at an attractive price, to Sheila Gunby and Bev Brown, who had been farming advisers on the magazine.
Meanwhile, Blyth Printing progressed. I remember a photo in The Standard of Harvey McCallum and Doug dismantling the old flat-bed newsprinting press. Doug got a small offset press and, with the space available with the newspaper press gone, got a larger offset press. Lorna provided the solid rock around which the new business grew.
Ken went to Fanshawe College to study Business Finance and then came home to work with his parents. Both he and they were progressives and continued to adapt the latest technology. Meanwhile, the old printing businesses that survived alongside the newspapers in most towns gradually died off under the incoming internet, leaving Blyth Printing as a unique entity. The business had survived and thrived nearly a century since 1938 under the vision of Ken, his father Doug and grandfather Ken.
We buried both Doug and Lorna, Lorna only recently, Doug years earlier. Doug was intimately involved in his community and I remember at his funeral the legendary actor David Fox attending. Doug was a former board member of the Blyth Festival. Ken recalls in his own retirement story, how printing posters for the Festival kept them on their toes with multiple trips through the printing press to achieve the process colour needed.
Blyth Printing has always been on top of recent technology. When I went in the door of the business in more recent years, I didn’t recognize any of the machines I was used to. Ken was up on recent technology and new machines are on hand for every job. Printing the Festival poster, for instance, has become easier with up-to-date equipment.
Meanwhile the newspaper industry has also changed in major ways. After a few years in the theatre business, including a fruitless attempt to create a winter-based touring theatre, I went back in the newspaper business in 1985, starting, with the late Sheila Richards, a community-owned company to create a newspaper for Blyth and Brussels. Jill and the late Bev Brown were also keys, as were Dianne Josling and Joan Caldwell.
We printed The Citizen for years with Signal-Star Publishing, despite that company changing hands several times. Finally, about a dozen years ago, the printing plant was closed and we had to find a new printer. Nearly all the newspapers in Huron County are printed by two companies and, for many, the staff has been reduced to the point there isn’t even an editor.
It’s ironic that back in 1971 the Whitmores sold the newspaper portion and continued commercial printing. Now, as the Whitmore ownership ends after 86 years, it is only their dedication to advanced technology that keeps them in business.
Meanwhile, the creativity of Deb, Shawn, Scott, Brenda and Joan keeps The Citizen going - two unique businesses.