After thousands of columns over 33 years, columnist says farewell to the Journal Star

Over 30-plus years, I’ve written thousands of columns for the Journal Star.

This is the last one.

I remember the first, in 1989. I was 25 and had been with the paper less than a year. At the time, the internet was a long way off, and I lived a block off Main Street.

So I got up early, hustled to the nearest newspaper box, plopped my coins into the slot and pulled out the morning city edition. (This was back when the Journal Star had three press runs over 20-plus counties across central Illinois, along with an afternoon Peoria edition.)

I riffled through the sections and spotted my spiky-haired mug, atop a sea of words. My column. I just stared and stared, less in pride than in stunned wonder.

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I’d grown up in a household receiving at least two newspapers a day, sometimes three. Even as a boy, I marveled at the notion of people — especially those with their little faces perched above their words — getting paid to write for a living.

I mean, bumping nouns and adjectives together? Even as a kid, I realized it was a skill we’d learned early in elementary school. And getting paid to shoot your mouth off? In class, that landed me in trouble, plenty. But here were grown-ups making a living doing just that.

And there, staring at my first column in 1989, I was amazed to find myself among them. I still am.

For one more day.

It still strikes me as an extraordinary and peculiar way to earn a paycheck. I recall, decades ago, explaining to my parents — long suffering over my lackadaisical and endless academic endeavors — that I planned to go into newspapering. My father, who at times would spend 1 ½ hours driving each way in rush hour for a job in Chicago that he never found reason to talk about, smiled and said, “Well, it beats working for a living.”

Indeed.

If that sounds smarmy, I don’t (for once) mean it that way. And I certainly don’t mean to make it sound as if reporters, photographers and other newspaper toilers don’t work hard. They do. And at the Journal Star, I’ve worked with some of the best in the business. To them, I offer my grateful tip o’ the hat. Regardless of the size of the newsroom, they’ve always worked with urgency, as if trying to beat the pants off the competing paper across town, even though no such competitor has existed for generations. Still, get the story, get it fast, get it right.

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Rather, what I mean is this: For the most part, this column hasn’t been work. It’s been a privilege.

I can’t speak for other columnists. But here, the reader-writer dynamic has been a partnership — sometimes rewarding, sometimes rocky, but always readable. Well, almost always.

The most common question from readers over the years: Where do you come up with so many column ideas? To me, it’s no big secret, but the industry doesn’t always agree with me.

See, since I’ve been in the business, newspapers nationwide have wrung their hands to conjure ways to stay relevant and goose circulation. They’ve reshaped, redesigned and refocused newspapers: new layouts, shorter stories, this new theory and that — all while gnashing and crying, “Lo, people don’t have time to read anymore!”

I never thought that was true. People always have time to read, as the internet has borne out. And not just TikTok-style fluff and flash. I believe now as I always have believed: that people are willing to make time to read interesting stories.

And that’s the key: not articles, but stories. During one of my early, floundering days, as I tried to find my footing as a columnist and connect with readers, a tired editor whispered, like Mr. Miyagi with a hangover, “People want to read about people.”

Boom. Life-changing. Career-changing. Peoria-changing.

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At such notions, Random Ax of Snideness ranters sniff and scoff. Their complaints have been loud and constant. It reminds me of a quote by the street philosopher Willie York: “I like this town. But this town don’t always like me.”

Preach, brother. I know the feeling.

That’s another peculiarly amusing thing about this job: I cannot begin to count the number of times I’ve been pelted with letters, calls and emails echoing this complaint: “For decades, your garbage columns have driven me crazy.”

Yet, for decades, you’ve kept reading.

Fascinating.

The catcalls never bothered me, even when things would turn ugly online. Like I said, it's a living. But I thank my wife for enduring such nastiness for years. It must be like being married to a prizefighter, at ringside seeing him pummeled over and over. I think of a battered Rocky Balboa: "Yo, Adrian! We did it."

An occasional complaint I’d hear: The column didn’t chew up and spit out enough people. Not enough slash and burn.

There’s a reason for that.

Though I have little raw athleticism — my only real sporting skill involved slogging, shoving and sputtering around a rugby pitch — I’ve mentally viewed this job as akin to that of a baseball pitcher. Every column is another pitch, each ideally chosen and delivered wisely.

Truth be told, I could’ve spent decades as a flamethrower, zinging nothing but fastballs, blowing people away amid fear-striking beanballs. Collateral damage be damned, right? After all, it’s not hard to be an angry and obnoxious blowhard day in and day out. It’s an approach often profitable in the news media, as you can hear any day from scorched-earth screamers and haters on AM radio.

And to be sure, with some stories and situations here, hurling a high, hard one was needed, to shake things up and put people in their place. But I think there’s also value in moving things around, with curveballs, change-ups and screwballs.

I’d like to think that many of you appreciated that mix as well. What pitch is being tossed out there on any given day? You have to step up to the plate (well, the newspaper) and see for yourself.

At its best, and at the risk of sounding overdramatic, this column has provided insight into the human condition, of everyday triumphs and tragedies in central Illinois. In this space, Joe and Jane Peoria have been brave enough to discuss circumstances — bad government, bad companies, bad luck — that have left them in a tight spot. At the very least, they got to speak their piece, to share their burdens, to have a voice.

Often, though, you readers would do more. You’d rally around them — with open minds, hearts and wallets — and lift them up, to try to make things right. Or, at least, a little bit better.

I never had to bother to set up a fundraising account or otherwise intervene. I let you decide. And you readers took care of that. You’d go out of your way, out of your comfort zone, to help strangers.

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Sometimes, one person might make a six-figure donation. Other times, many people would come forward with dollar bills. But the sum didn’t matter. Any amount — or a word or a card or a smile that you’d ask me to pass along — was invaluable in terms of kindness and connection.

Over and over again.

From my vantage, I’ve had the good fortune to watch all that goodwill and generosity blossom and flourish. For all the bad in the world, readers have shown me that there’s still plenty of good.

Witnessing that has been a great blessing.

Not long after that first column, the spiky hair vanished. These days, much of what’s left is sparse and gray.

But just as there’s still some hair up top, there’s also still a little life left in my pitching arm. I’m not hanging ‘em up but moving across town. I’ll be telling stories for WTVP, Channel 47.

So, I’ll still be around. Just in a different way.

As I write those words, I can already hear the groaning from boo birds who were hoping to read here about my retirement. Sorry to disappoint you. But at least it gives you something to grumble about. Again.

You’re welcome.

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Meanwhile, we move onward, just as it’s been for 33 years — a third of a century! — stretching over five decades.

That’s a long time. I have a few relationships and friendships that have lasted that long. But not many.

Thanks for being one of them. I appreciate your sharing your stories here, for answering my knock at your door, for making it all possible.

I hope at least a few of you feel the same way.

Phil Luciano was a Journal Star columnist. Follow him at facebook.com/philluciano and on Twitter @LucianoPhil.

This article originally appeared on Journal Star: Peoria Journal Star columnist Phil Luciano leaves paper after 33 years