no paper delivery today . y , the carrier been at my house waiting all night and no way to contact them

Wow, I grew up in this locale and read this newspaper daily. I also used to deliver newspapers for them, as a newspaper carrier (we were called "paper boys" or "paper girls" back in the day, aka independent contractors), from home to home, in the 80's. This was when I was a child in middle school and high school. Back then, they had kids (and they were always kids, but you have to be at least 12) deliver newspapers in a neighborhood, by walking or sometimes by bike, and also go house to house to collect money from the subscribers on a weekly basis. And no, newspaper carriers could not just throw the newspaper on people's lawns from a bike like you see in the movies. We had to place each copy in the screen door, in the mail slot, or wherever the person wanted it. Some houses forbid you to cut through their lawns as a shortcut to the next house. For one house, I had to walk around tons of dog poop left all over the yard and walkway. I hated going there; it was like a minefield of poop. I nicknamed it "Shitland Squares", lol. This newspaper was a originally newspaper that came out in the mid afternoon, six days a week; there was no Sunday edition. They printed it by noon. It was called "The Dunkirk Evening Observer", then just "The Evening Observer", then just "The Observer", and now "The Observer Today". It became a morning newspaper years ago, and they added a Sunday edition. The probably have professional drivers who deliver the newspaper now by car. When I delivered the newspaper in the early/mid-80's, it was just $0.25 a copy. Then they raised the price to $0.30. This was a bummer for me, as my tips decreased when they did that. One person, a widow who was like in her 80's, gave me a $0.10 tip each week when everyone else was giving me a quarter of $0.50. She thought that was a good tip, but was stuck in a time warp. I thought that was funny, but always was nice and appreciative to her. The Monday paper was heavy, and I had to carry 50 copies of these in my bag. It was heavy because the Saturday newspaper came out super early, mid-morning so the staff could have their weekend off, and there was no Sunday paper. So the Monday edition was jam packed with all of the news for the past two and a half days. The Thursday paper was also heavy, since that was when all the sales ad fliers went out. The Saturday newspaper was so small it was a joke. I could carry 50 copies under one arm, lol. Since I had to deliver this newspaper in the mid-afternoon, this meant that I did not have to get up early to deliver a morning newspaper in the cold and non-shoveled snow like some of my fellow students did. I was also to save up about $3,000 from my work as a carrier before going to college. But there were cons too. I had to miss most after-school activities and sports teams since I had to go to work. This led to a lot of missed socialization opportunities, which are critical to youth development, perhaps even more so than academics. The newspaper back then was a good source of information. I read it everyday in my school years and learned quite a bit. The paper seemed more neutral in tone, politically; back then, but I don't know for a fact, since I was just a kid. There was an article one say in the religion section of the Saturday edition when I was a kid which said something like: "Batting 1000 in life". I laughed, since I knew it should have been "1.000", since you batting average is a percent, from 0 to 1. Back in those days, mostly everyone subscribed to the newspaper, as that was a critical piece where people got their information from. That and the television news. The Evening Observer was a big part of our family. My grandparents, who raised me, read it daily, and so did I. I looked forward to learning what was happening in the world, and also the sports scores from the day before. In the 2000's, they used to charge you to read some online sections. I am glad they stopped this. It was hard for me to read up on my hometown news when they did this. I wouldn't have paid for that privilege, since I no longer live there, and the occasional times I go there would not have been worth the cost of a subscription. They used to also have online comments on articles, but I see they have stopped this now, as have some other websites, like ESPN and the Topix forums. read more