Just a Gal from Glidden: A picture is worth a thousand words
BY KATE WINQUIST
kate@yoursouthwest.com
I'm not sure why I decided to become a newspaper publisher. English was always one of my better subjects in school. Going through some old report cards, my story, "My Life As A Pencil" was the literary highlight of my Grade 6 year! Was this the beginning of my writing career? Doubtful, for sure. It took another five years before I realized that I did enjoy writing and spelling. My favourite teacher was Valerie Burghardt. She was my Grade 11 English teacher at KCS. I remember reading To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee and Shakespeare's Macbeth. They were both so much better than Julius Caesar and Margaret Atwood! (sorry, Mr. Gerle).
PHOTOS BY KATE WINQUIST
Who says Saskatchewan is flat? The beautiful South Saskatchewan River hills at Lemsford Ferry crossing.
The days of the Polaroid camera. My sister Carrie, Mom and I.
During my time as Manging Editor at the Maple Creek News, I was able to take in many high calibre events like the Indian Relay Races.
My Grade 12 year was similar. I enjoyed Mr. Welte's English class. I didn't mind getting up in front of my classmates for the oral reports. I even remember writing a couple of my friend's assignments for her. (I will not mention any names, but she just opened up a spectacular clothing shop in Kindersley). I'll admit that my grades were never the best. I struggled with the maths and sciences. I did not make the honour roll. To be truthful, I wasn't sure that I would get into any post-secondary schools with a C+ average.
I knew I wanted to do something artistically related when I left high school. I had pretty much made that decision after attending a field trip with "Granny" Smith's Grade 10 Art class to Saskatoon back in 1985. We went to artist/sculpturer Bill Epp's foundry at his farm near Martensville, and I was inspired. Art was no longer just an "easy" credit in school, I made the conscious decision that I wanted to excel, even if it meant doing charcoal still-life renderings of cattails in a vase and plastic fruit in a bowl, over and over again.
I applied to the Visual Communications program at Medicine Hat College and thankfully was accepted. I started this three-year program in the fall of 1987. Most of the classes were art related, but we still had to take English and wouldn't you know it, a Margaret Atwood novel. It was like Grade 10 all over again, much to my dismay! To make matters worse, the English class was at 8:00 a.m. Much too early for an art student whose creative juices didn't start flowing until after midnight.
I did manage to pass the class and received my Diploma in Visual Communications in 1990. I was now ready for the real world, wherever that was going to take me.
The real world has taken me to such places as Lethbridge, Medicine Hat, Shaunavon, Gull Lake, Maple Creek, and Kindersley.
But that still doesn't answer the question of why I became a newspaper publisher? Most newspaper publishers have a journalism background or at least a sales background. I have neither. As it turns out, newspapers consist of words and stories, but they also have photos, graphics and other things to catch your eye. If you believe the saying, "A picture is worth a thousand words," I probably have a million words on my DSL camera.
My obsession with photography takes me back to the year my Dad purchased a Polaroid camera. They made horrible photos, but it was pretty cool how it was instant. No waiting for weeks to get your pictures developed. Maybe it was a photography class with Moff Kay at KCS. Why they combined that class with small engine repair, I have not figured out. It may have been the three years that I took photography in College. I think all of these things had a contributing factor to my photography habit, but it wasn't until I purchased the Gull Lake Advance in 2009, that I realized how important photos are to a newspaper. I had a small point and shoot camera, but it wasn't good quality. My husband surprised me and bought me a Canon camera for my 40th birthday, a mere month after I had published my first edition at Gull Lake. That's when the obsession took place. That camera went everywhere I went. People started calling me the Crazy Camera Lady. Camera Lady would have been sufficient. I'm not sure why the cRaZy part was thrown in there.
So, even though you will still see articles and stories (after all, this is a newspaper), you will see plenty of photos throughout the area as I go on my weekly adventures through west-central Saskatchewan. I will publish some of my favourites here and on our website, Facebook and Instagram pages, because a picture is worth a thousand words. That, my friends, is why I became a newspaper publisher. I invite you to see this area through the eyes of my camera lens.
- KW