Have you ever looked closely at the column on the page across from this one? There’s a lot worth noting, and something special there this issue.

It’s especially important to note all of those names below the editor’s.

These people make this magazine possible, mostly correct, lively and beautiful. And then they get it delivered to you. Unlike the editor, who - despite my pleas - gets her photo in every issue, these fine and talented folks are rarely seen by readers and often don’t get the credit due them. If you’ve called to our office, you’ve heard one or two of their friendly voices … real, live voices. (We still answer our phones ourselves. Computer voices hate us.)

You’ll see on that list next door other important names of people and businesses that help us and you’ll notice the logos of two professional associations of which we are proud members: Minnesota Magazine and Publications Association and International Regional Magazine Association.

Another critical list can be found near the back of this magazine - a list of our advertisers. A few names go back almost to the magazine’s beginning. Others are new and their numbers, thankfully, are growing. Subscribers and advertisers are how we pay for what we get to do.

Many others help us every day in ways tall and small and aren’t always on those lists. Lake Superior is a Big Lake, but it’s still a local neighborhood.

We depend on each other. Just the other day, I got to do something you can’t do just anywhere. I called to ask the Duluth Seaway Port Authority for some taconite to enhance our display of Minnesota’s Iron Country.

“We have a cup of taconite here for you,” came the quick reply.

Really, how many other places can you borrow a cup of taconite?

We’ve borrowed something else for the office that is extremely important and interesting to boot.

In the picture below, I’m standing beside a display that we’ve borrowed - long term - from the Great Lakes Shipwreck Preservation Society, a group of generous folks with the lofty goal of preserving our underwater heritage by protecting shipwrecks.

To find out the scoop on what adventure can be found up this staircase, you’ll need to read the “Lake Superior Journal” for details. (I’m not giving away the plot here, really.)

But back to our list.

In the small print about half-way down, there is a line identifying this issue as Volume 28 Issue 4, August/September 2006, No. 150.

That translates into our 28th year of publishing, the fourth of six issues in this publishing year and - ta-da! - the 150th time the magazine has come off the presses.

Yes, we quietly are passing a milepost - 150 issues worth.

There are many things to be said about reaching issue No. 150, but what I find most amazing is that a few of you will be putting this issue on the shelf with 149 others.

How humbling, exciting and a little terrifying for an old newspaperwoman (that would be me). Guaranteed, no reader kept every issue of the newspapers on which I’ve worked - although we sure worked hard to make them worth it. (Actually, Mom would have kept every one of the newspapers, but I was careful not to send them all or I’d be storing them in my basement now.)

Almost as much as my mom, though, you are family to us here at the magazine. We work hard to make you proud of what we send. Usually we get it right and sometimes we get a note with some gentle redirecting. It’s what we expect from family and neighbors.

Thank you.

Return to Table of Contents