1,000 Words: A Strib goodbye

It’s not fashionable to like newspapers anymore, but Baird Helgeson’s John Reinan’s tweet today is a solid reminder of the daily miracle that happens each day, and ghosts of the past that give a newspaper its life.

The Star Tribune is leaving its old building, and before leaving, reporter Randy Furst wrote the names of people who once worked there on a pillar.

Others wrote their own names.

Of particular note is that someone also wrote and circled the name of Larry Oakes, the fine reporter from the North Country who took his own life two years ago, and deserves to be remembered in the newsrooms in which he toiled.

Institutional memory is one of the most underappreciated values of newsrooms.

Related: Photos: Star Tribune staff says goodbye to old building (MPR News).