Monday’s shocking announcement of the closing of the Halifax Daily News sent me reeling. I was there from day one in 1979 until I left in 1988 to become Vince MacLean’s press secretary. Okay, I’ve never professed to being smart.

After the shock abated, I began to reflect on those early days and maybe the nine greatest years of my life. With more days behind me than ahead, I don’t envision a new and dazzling career ….

In August 1979 I happened to bump into Lyndon Watkins, who told me that his good friend David Bentley, publisher of the Bedford-Sackville News, was taking the paper daily. “You should give him a call, he’s looking for a sports editor,” Lyndon suggested. I did and two days later I was hired.

David, his wife Diana, along with Patrick and Joyce Sims, were partners in the venture. The Weekly News was thriving, and David, like most journalists of the day, myself included, dreamed of competing with the Halifax Herald. It was a bold step, to say the least.

In the early days, probably the first three years, a handful of dedicated souls did it all. We would arrive a 6am and depart at 6pm Monday to Thursday. On Friday it was 6am to 10pm. After we put the Friday paper to bed, we began work on the Saturday edition, sending it downstairs to the presses around ten o’clock.

David and I would write stories, edit copy, edit and run the wire and then lay out and paste up the pages. David worked from the front towards the back and I started on the back page (it was page one of the sports section) and came towards the middle. The daily process took between four and five hours. Press time in those days was noon-ish.

I vividly recall the very first edition. We worked feverishly that Monday morning. Trial and error ruled the day. David put the final touches on the front page, called me over as a second pair of eyes to give it the final edit. Signing it off, I turned to him and said, “What’s the press run?”. It was a question he hadn’t expected.

In all the planning, no thought had been given to the numbers of copies to be printed.

“What do you think?”, he asked. We batted around some numbers and settled on 1,500 copies. They hit the streets and it was the beginning of a new era for the metro media. I think the Daily News (Archbishop James Hayes once told me he refers to it as the “BS” News, ouch!)  eventually made the Herald a much better paper. I think the electronic

media also benefited from our presence, because in those days, we broke stories that would have remained hidden forever.

There were no sacred cows. No politician had immunity. Everyone and everything was fair game. Screw up and you paid the price. One day, David rushed in, almost at press time, wanting to change the front page. He had been caught speeding on the Magazine Hill and insisted the incident be reported.

I recall receiving a telephone call from a local businessman who was concerned about  a local doctor who had been caught shoplifting in his store. The doctor used his connections to get his trial moved from Bedford to Halifax, away from our court reporter. We didn’t have the money to staff the courts of Halifax and Dartmouth. Thanks to the call, we sent a reporter to the court and the doctor paid the price -  it was  noted in the pages of the “BS” News.

There were outrageous moments too. Like January 16, 1982, when we ran the story of the Air Florida plane that came down in a severe snowstorm, crashing into the Potomac River, killing 78 people. David, a white-knuckler, laid out the story, and put a heading over a picture of a body being lifted out of the river. “Another Dissatisfied Customer,” screamed the heading. I was mortified.

But even that incident paled when, in 1984, David and Diana attended a local reception for visiting royals, Prince Charles and Princess Di. The press were sworn to secrecy. It was an “Everything heard here stays here” event.  They didn’t know David and Diana. Between them they picked up some juicy tidbits.

The next day, our pages were full of royal secrets, and we were under media attack from papers as far away as Australia. It was, as I like to say, a character-building experience.

As a matter of  fact, that is exactly how I would summarize those nine years.

(Al Hollingsworth is a retired journalist who began as the sports editor of the Daily News, became the Editor and wrote six columns a week, including a two-page spread on Saturdays called The Morning After)