On April 25, 2001, Susan and I launched the first edition of the Tulsa Beacon.

This wasn’t the first time we had started a newspaper.

In 1984, I was the suburban reporter for the daily paper and I covered Glenpool on a regular basis. I got to know the city manager, the bank president, the mayor, the grocer, the postmaster and most of the movers and shakers in town.

Glenpool did not have a newspaper because it had grown up overnight. In 1980, there were about 2,500 residents and by 1984, there were 6,000.

The metal plate used to print the front page of our first edition hangs in my office.

We ran the Glenpool Post for three years and sold it. We started having kids and we thought Susan needed to be a stay-at-home mom.

We sold the Glenpool Post to Neighbor Newspapers. Later, they sold it to a group in Arkansas which combined it with the Bixby Bulletin and the Jenks Journal. A few years ago, they closed the Tri-city News and now there is no weekly paper in Glenpool. This is sad because Glenpool has really grown in the past few years with a significant retail/restaurant expansion near City Hall at 121st Street and Highway 75.

I went back to work for the daily paper and started zoned editions.

In 2000, I left the daily paper for the second time. My Christian faith always affected my writing and elements in the newsroom wanted to control my work, so I quit.

I immediately took a job as managing editor of a trade magazine – Cable World – in Denver, Colorado. I went to Denver while Susan stayed in Tulsa with our three kids. The plan was for them to move once we sold our house.

I was in Denver for six months and the house never sold. About four months after I got to Denver, my boss in New York called and said the company was going to be moved to New York City.

New York City?

Susan was chosen as a contestant on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and we got an all-expenses-paid trip to the Big Apple. She didn’t win any money but after prayerful consideration, we decided not to move to New York.

We decided to stay in Tulsa and start a newspaper – a conservative newspaper with Christian values. I felt that Tulsa was populated mostly with people with similar values but they weren’t being served by the big paper.

By the way, Cable World was later sold and is now out of business.

Beginning in the 1980s, afternoon newspapers started going out of business. The Tulsa Tribune was purchased and closed in 1992. That left the other paper with a monopoly situation.

All across the nation, readers complained about liberal news coverage, poor service and high prices but to no avail. In a monopoly situation, prices go up and service goes down.

So we started the Tulsa Beacon. Liberals said we couldn’t last and would soon go out of business. That almost happened a couple of times but God’s grace was sufficient for us to stay.

The newspaper industry has changed dramatically. Big daily papers are losing their subscriber base. They lost the classified business to Craig’s List and much of their automobile advertising to the Internet.

Display advertising has tanked and circulation revenue is dropping. Newspapers don’t make much at all from websites and the industry is in trouble.

The biggest problem is that young people don’t read newspapers. They read the Internet on their cellphones. (They don’t watch the local TV news, either).

But somehow we survive. Later this month, we will celebrate our 18th anniversary. That is a tribute to God’s help and the faithful support of our advertisers, readers and subscribers.

A few years ago, without warning, QuikTrip refused to sell the Tulsa Beacon anymore. The late Dan Keating called QuikTrip to ask for an explanation and they refused to answer.

But we never sold a bunch of papers at QuikTrip and we had a small surge of new subscribers – folks who used to buy the Tulsa Beacon at QuikTrip but now wanted it delivered to their home. It was a financial wash.

What happens now?

First, our subscription list has gone down for a variety of reasons. We do get new subscribers every month when one of our subscribers recommends it to a friend.

Our display advertising has shrunk but our legal advertising is the best it has ever been. We are one of only two legal papers in Tulsa County and we get new accounts almost every month.

Over the years, I have had people in Oklahoma City ask me to start a paper in that city. That’s easier said than done but those people wish they had a conservative voice there.

Susan and I will keep on keeping on. God has called us into this work and we will continue to serve at His pleasure.

Thanks to everyone who supports the Tulsa Beacon.