It’s been a good ride!

As you know by now, The Clarksdale Blues-Star has ceased to publish with the publication of today’s issue. Therefore, this is my final column.

How do you say goodbye?

First, I want to thank our advertisers, who were too few. Those who were with us from the get-go are appreciated more than they can ever know. Those who joined us along the way are also appreciated and I hope you benefited from the experience.

Secondly, I want to send out kudos to the newspaper’s staff, who worked diligently, sometimes above the call of duty, to insure a quality publication. I know we published a quality publication every week.

And, I know our sales staff offered quality deals to each business in Clarksdale, whether they took advantage of the offer or not. If a business did advertise in the Blue-Star, it benefited. If it didn’t, it was its loss. It’s that simple.

Finally, I want to thank you, my faithful readers. It was you that made my day, day after day, telling me how much you enjoyed my efforts. You see, it was you who mattered most to me. When I was writing my Sunday column, you were foremost on my mind for I always tried to choose a topic I thought you would enjoy, a topic I felt you would be interested in.

Yes, you.

Then, to have you call me, or stop me on the street, or see me at Wal-Mart and tell me how much you enjoyed my column was my ultimate reward.

I’ll never forget you.

There have been so many positive things happen during the past eight months it would be impossible to list them here.

However, the new friends I have made with Americans Against Horse Slaughter has to rank among the greatest things that have happened to me. They do not have a selfish bone in their bodies; they are totally for the horses, sacrificing money, time and effort on behalf of the poor horses being killed for no reason. We need to continue to support this great group of heroes.

We need to keep an eye on our government t leaders and support their efforts when they are worthy of support and criticize them when they aren’t worthy. We need to thank the legislators for their efforts on our behalf.

At the same time, we need to let our Governor and Legislators what we want and what we don’t want. If they don’t give us what we want, we need to get rid of them. Period. It’s called a Democracy, although I’m not sure we are demanding a Democracy at the moment. We need to.

When we developed this newspaper, we envisioned a publication that would reflect Clarksdale and its people. Our writers, for the most part, were Clarksdalians writing about Clarksdale people and places. We tried to write positive things whenever possible.

I’ll never forget the battle waged when deciding what to call our paper. Again, we wanted to adopt a name that was indicative of the type of town Clarksdale was; a name that reflected the character of the city.

We couldn’t deny that Clarksdale was known as the “Home of the Blues,” perhaps more so than any other place in the Mississippi Delta. Further, it was a star of the Delta.

In the end, it seemed like a natural to call it The Clarksdale-Blues Star, so we did. And we’re proud that you adopted it as your own.

As I said, it’s been a good ride but we knew going in that this economy was not conducive to opening a new newspaper in Clarksdale or anywhere else. We did what we could but evidently there are not enough Clarksdale people willing to part with their money for the good of the community. And that’s the bottom line.

So, thanks again, my faithful readers.

Let’s hope we see each other in the newspaper again sometime somewhere down the road.