A cause for us to celebrate

 

[December 31, 2020] 

As 2020 finally draws to a close (and it sure has been a long year), we not only celebrate because this difficult year is passing, but bring to your attention something else worthy of celebrating: Lincoln Daily News turned twenty this year!

The plan to start LDN happened way back in the stone age of Internet connectivity in July 1999, the year of Y2K (the internet was born in 1995 and began locally in 1996). We dreamed LDN up because we recognized the need for local content on the WWW. Two other local dreamers joined us at that time, Sam Redding of ADI (Academic Development Institute) and Tom Seggelke of Key Printing. Together with Tom's son Ryan, we met together, slaved together, and on January 27, 2000 launched Lincoln Daily News to a first edition audience of 750 readers.

We recruited Natalie Jeckel (now McGee) to manage the content and staff, along with Tyler Havlin to do the web design, and our only journalistic professional, Mary Krallmann to copy edit and make all our writing look good. Over the years we have worked with many fine and talented people, and grew to be what we are today: an online news source serving an average of 14,000 readers a day, supported completely by local advertising.

We also had the good fortune to have a real news dog with experience in Joan Crabb, who joined us at the start and paved the way setting journalistic standards. She was a go getter, first to cover city of Lincoln government and did other terrific human interest stories out and about Logan County.

The going was tough for the first six years and acquiring readers and news was difficult. Few people were on the internet, and few advertisers saw value in an online newspaper. LDN survived on sheer determination and the financial contributions of a few individuals including Lloyd Kirby, who was then director of the Logan County Health Department and a few other undisclosed encouragers who sent sums of just the right amount at just at the right moment. Thank you again, you know who.

In 2007, we branched out adding state, national and international news first from the Associated Press and later from Reuters in order to appeal to a wider audience and give advertisers more value.

LDN also changed from being an afternoon newspaper to become a morning paper, publishing all fresh news articles six days a week at 8 a.m.

Over the years LDN has had numerous facelifts keeping a fresh look, layout changes, and content additions. In the last 10 years we have added fifteen annual print and online magazines to the mix.

The people behind the screen

Along the way we were joined by many amazing people to bring you the daily news. Jan Youngquist has served as managing editor/editor in chief for twenty years now, managing our stable of writers and scrutinizing LDN writer articles not only for spelling, grammar and punctuation errors, but to also make sure that what we are reporting is readable and accurate.

News Director Nila Smith wears many hats, doing the huge task of scheduling articles and news releases in LDN and assembling most of the local content each night. She covers all things city today, and goes out on special event assignments and other community related activities, in addition to wearing the LDN Ribbon Cut Team coordinator hat. No, she doesn't sleep, much.

Advertising Director Karen Hargis brought financial stability to LDN and not only sells ads, but along with Roy Logan (newly retired), Lisa Ramlow, and Nila Smith do community and public relations for LDN. This creative team has done great things and one of those things has been to bring our community together in creating greater awareness of breast cancer and supporting local survivors. They also implemented the Community Champion, recognizing citizens who also care deeply for our community. It is easy to see that they, like all of us, are driven by love of community.

The art team of Dee Vandevender and Lisa Whitson do magic with advertising and magazine layout. Just look through any one of our sensational magazines, always found on the magazine rack and you will get a concentrated look at their talents.

Sports writer Teena Lowery brings you the best in local sports, Angela Reiners covers county government, and Nila Smith covers Lincoln city government. Guest writers Jeff Mayfield and Greg Taylor (often joined by Tom Seggelke) bring us first person coverage, highlights and commentary on Illini basketball, and a host of other uniquely talented writers bring you local news with excellent writing and amazing photos.

Curt Schleich has helped us through many technical problems.

Today, Lincoln Daily News appreciates all those in our history who contributed to twenty successful years of publishing our community's news.

While challenged in its early and formative years, LDN remains undaunted by 2020 with the expectation and desire to continue serving our community as always to the best of our ability. We stand ready to continue aiding our community to a position of strength and wholeness exiting this pandemic.

We have been blessed through the years to be able to bring you, our readers, the stories of our citizens, our county, and our place in the world, and look forward to many more years to serve you. Cheers, thank you, and God bless!

[Jim Youngquist, publisher]