Paul's story

By Jennifer McBride/Leader Staff

By all rights, his fingers should be smudged with five decades of printer's ink. Paul Fugleberg has written hundreds of stories, proofread thousands of pages and left an indelible impression on innumerable lives. Not bad for an asthmatic college dropout.

First Impressions

One person Fugleberg touched was Glenn Timm, who met the new Flathead Courier newspaper editor in 1959, shortly after Fugleberg moved to Polson.

"I remember Paul Fugleberg coming around the corner holding a big, Rolex Camera," said Timm, who was then 17. His family operated the Polson airport. "It was a fancy box camera and I'd never seen it before." Fugleberg was one of the first to arrive at the airport when anything happened, even if it was a plane crashing into the lake at 7:30 a.m. When there weren't any emergencies, Fugleberg came to the airport to write stories, take pictures and fly — which Paul enjoyed since he was first introduced to planes while working on his aunt's potato farm.

Despite being a writer, Fugleberg is a man of few words. Jim Duford was running a business when Fugleberg moved to Polson. He said Fugleberg is "quiet but real caring" and "real shy in a lot of ways."

"You just had to encourage Paul because he wasn't brave enough to go out and meet people on his own," he said.

Duford met first Fugleberg through the Courier, where he placed advertisements. The two of them bonded over a subject near and dear to Fugleberg's heart — history. They started having breakfast every Tuesday morning. They worked together on the board of the Polson-Flathead Historical Museum and, though the decades, Fugleberg would often come to Duford to discuss historical tidbits for either his articles or his books. Duford had been in Polson since the 1930s, so he if he didn't know something Fugleberg wanted to know about Polson, he usually knew someone who would.

Fugleberg said he loved history, even as a kid. Fugleberg's mother taught him to read, and as a child, he would go downstairs and read the evening paper on the stoop before bringing it to his parents.

"I remember reading about the death of Will Rogers when I was about five years old," Fugleberg said.

He probably never imagined he would interview Will Rogers Jr. many years later.

Writer

Fugleberg had his first brush with journalism back at Los Angeles City College, which he attended from 1948-1950. He had always enjoyed writing, so he enrolled in a journalism course one semester.

"I couldn't stand it," Fugleberg said. "All the details and so forth."

Still unsure of what he wanted to do with his life, Fugleberg attended UCLA for one quarter before enlisting in the U.S. Air Force in December 1950. He called signing up "the smartest thing I had done" because it led him to his eventual passion — newspapers. Fugleberg was a trainer at Great Falls and never actually flew planes in combat, but he did start writing a column for the base newspaper, calling himself the "Wonderin' G.I."

Even the column name makes Fugleberg cringe now, who called his writing style very "country-esque."

"I didn't know much back then," he said.

Fugleberg continued working in Great Falls and was eventually was promoted to editor of the base paper in 1953. He was promoted to non-commissioned officer in charge of the public information office. The state editor of the Great Falls Tribune took Fugleberg under his wing.

"He was like a second dad to me," Fugleberg said. "He taught me all the basics of the newspaper game." Fugleberg offered the same mentoring to many young editors and writers over the years.

After his discharge from the service in December 1954, Fugleberg moved 50 miles north of Billings to become associate editor of the Roundup Record Tribune. He also worked as a correspondent for the Great Falls Tribune, the Billings Gazette, the Associated Press and United Press International.

While working through the Record Tribune, Fugleberg started noticing some errors in the copy and so traveled to the printing office in Lewiston to find out what had happened. There, he met Mary Lou Erickson, the proofreader and publisher's secretary. In the snap of two fingers, Fugleberg said he fell in love with his future wife.

"I always said I courted her over 100,000 miles," he added.

The two of them were married in 1955. Like many in the newspaper business, they moved around a lot. In 1956, they moved to Canton, S.D., where Fugleberg was associate editor at Sioux Valley News while Erickson learned to set type. In 1958, Fugleberg moved back to California as a staff member of Chalfant Press, which published several weekly papers.

Then, in 1959, Fugleberg applied for a position as editor of the Flathead Courier. The paper was owned by Treasure State Industries at the time, Fugleberg said — a corporation which he knew had the habit of buying various properties and then turning around and selling them.

"We thought, if I was editor, maybe they'd give us first chance to buy," Fugleberg said. He got his wish in 1963, when he and his business partner, Lorrin Jacobson, bought the Courier.

Editor

March 5, 1959, sandwiched between advertisements for refrigerators, cars and girdles, was a small article introducing the Courier's new editor, who was in his late twenties. In 1959, Polson was smaller. The economy was driven by tourism and lumber mills. When Fugleberg started editing the paper, the Courier's circulation was less than 2,000. An average paper was 12 pages long and a year's subscription was $3. The Courier's printing press was in the basement of Security State Bank, and the staff used a rope-pulled elevator to move things up and down. The paper printed four pages at a time.

"Among Other Things," Fugleberg's long-standing column, appeared in his second issue. He wrote about topics ranging from "chuckholes" (i.e., potholes) to inflation ("If a clip job costs between $1.75 and $2, the cost of living is inflated") to state politics.

"Legislators at Helena had to stop the clocks in order to finish this season's business," he wrote March 12. "If only they could stop spending as easily as they can stop time."

The week after his first column appeared, Fugleberg wrote, "We received several comments about this column's debut in last week's issue — but we'll keep writing it anyway!"

Despite the joke, Fugleberg said he felt very welcome in Polson. He said his goal was to make the newspaper a mirror of the community.

"It should reflect the good and the bad," he said. "We tried to emphasize the good without ignoring the bad."

At the time, the papers were full of stories about a fight between the Army Corps of Engineers, who wanted to build the Paradise and Knowles Dams against the wishes of the local populace. Other groups were also squaring off. The tribal and non-tribal communities began to clash as the American Indians began asserting more rights.

"We tried to cover both sides of it, which made the one side complain and then the other side complain," Fugleberg said. "So we figured we were somewhere in the middle and offered accurate coverage."

Fugleberg also tried to be non-partisan on election night. The Courier always threw a party while people waited for the results, which Fugleberg posted on a large chalkboard. Democrats had to bring the cookies while Republicans brought the beverages. The arguments, Fugleberg said, were always good natured.

Things at the paper didn't always work out so peacefully. A few weeks after Fugleberg started working at the Courier, at the last minute, the picture plates for the paper disappeared on their way down from Kalispell. The Courier ran with big blank spaces instead of photos.

Another problem soon reared its ugly head. Fugleberg wrote about it in the April 9, 1959 Courier.

"Printer Don Yager…said, 'You print it like that and the roof will come down.' " At 12:17 p.m. that day, it did. No one was injured, but it did break the typewriters, destroy monthly reports and generally cause havoc. Worse, it happened on April Fool's Day. When Fugleberg told his wife what had happened, she didn't believe him and told him to stop being "smart."

After buying the Courier, Fugleberg and Jacobson added the Ronan Pioneer to their collection of papers in 1971.

"It was pretty obvious that the merger of the papers was in the cards," he said. The Pioneer had previously merged with the St. Ignatius Post, and between the two papers, Fugleberg had the majority of the county covered.

While under his leadership, the Courier won two National Newspaper Association awards and five Montana Newspaper Association awards, including awards for best editorial, best column and general excellence.

Family man

Besides Erickson, Fugleberg and its regular staff, the paper had a few other "unofficial" employees: Fugleberg's five children. Fugleberg said the children's duties ranged from dusting to casting pigs (lead bars used in printing). As they grew older, they wrote stories and took pictures. Fugleberg's eldest daughter, Ruth, said her father was a good boss.

"He was a very generous employer," Ruth said. "He paid me 25 cents and a bottle of Grape Smash."

Ruth said her father would also send the children off on "photo scavenger hunts," riding all over the town on their bicycles to find new leads for stories. She remembers coming back to the smell of the newspaper office, and the licorice ice cream Fugleberg would buy her when he took her on business trips to Kalispell.

Tom, Fugleberg's youngest son, remembers getting dressed up and handing out papers at the Fourth of July parade, while Mark, Fugleberg's middle son, remembers stacking up boxes in the office, creating cardboard forts to play in. All his kids remember their father using vacations as a good excuse to research new stories.

Despite the long hours Fugleberg put into the paper, he always took time for his family.

"He'd come home from a long day and promptly fall asleep in his chair, but then he'd get up a few minutes later and start throwing grounders or playing baseball or throwing footballs to us kids," Ruth said. "You couldn't ask for a better dad. Though he never did have a good jump shot."

Fugleberg didn't just pitch baseballs. At the Rotary summer softball games, Mark said his father had the chance to be a special guest pitcher. But instead of a ball, he tossed a cantaloupe, which would splatter all over a local batter.

"It was a big mess," Mark said.

Unfortunately, Fugleberg said his wife's health took a turn for the worse after she was diagnosed with Sjogren's Syndrome, a rare autoimmune disease which causes the white blood cells to begin attacking the moisture glands of the body. While the symptoms can be treated, there was no cure. His wife's health struggle and 20 years in the business left Fugleberg feeling burned out, he explained. He started looking for buyers for the paper in 1980. Ruth said her father first tried to sell the paper to her, hoping that he could keep it in the family. Ruth was going to school out of state and didn't plan on moving back to Montana.

"I felt like I'd let dad down," she said. "None of us ended up doing the newspaper thing."

Fugleberg sold the Courier in 1983 to Carmine and Todd Mowbray and devoted a lot of his time to freelancing, selling articles with titles like "Is there a solution for pollution in Polson?"

In the early 1990s, Fugleberg put out a handful of small booklets, including "Montana Nessie," which was about the legendary Flathead Lake monster.

"I think that's his secret passion, being the foremost Flathead Monster expert," Mark said with a laugh. "That's all you really need to write about him."

Mentor

In 1973, John Schnase got his first "real job" as editor of the Ronan Pioneer. He said he's been inspired by Fugleberg ever since.

"There was no job he wouldn't tackle," he explained, whether it was putting address labels on papers or making sure the mail bags were full. "He wasn't afraid to do anything," he said. "He didn't just do the writing, he did the whole thing. He would drive the papers around if need be or whatever."

Schnase left the Pioneer after a few years to teach, but returned as the Pioneer's manager in 1985. Despite the fact Fugleberg had, in theory, retired, he hung around the office, proofreading pages and writing columns.

Carmine Mowbray said she and her husband asked him to stay on as editor emeritus after they bought the paper.

"We depended on him and Mary Lou for help, philosophical guidance and good old fashioned elbow grease," she said. She was especially impressed with his grasp of local history. "Part of the reason people live in small towns [is] because they have a strong sense of story," Mowbray said. "Paul kept that alive with us." That was especially important because the Mowbrays were not born and raised in Polson. Fugleberg gave the paper a sense of continuity. The continuity continued after the Mowbrays combined the Courier, the Pioneer and the Mission Valley News into one newspaper in November 1990.

"Paul was almost the face of the paper," said Timm, who worked as a Leader reporter for ten years. "He knew everybody, everybody knew him and everybody trusted him."

Fugleberg was always onhand to lend a cool head if things erupted into chaos. In January 1984, the paper had already gone to press in January 1984 when an evening shoot-out between a 27-year-old robbery suspect and police ended in a hostage's death. According to court documents, David Cameron Keith held a 13-year-old child hostage, using the boy to negotiate his way past police checkpoints to the Polson airport. Local pilot Lee Shryock, 64, agreed to board the plane if the boy was released. Keith released the boy, but killed Shryock after a deputy shot him.

"Our staff was just so shocked," Mowbray said. "They didn't quite know what to do. Paul immediately took the leadership role and with an appropriate amount of sensitivity got the story out in a special edition."

At less dramatic moments, Fugleberg would fill in for sick or vacationing reporters. Fugleberg was a constant fixture in the newsroom, Timm said, coming in at least twice a week. Fugleberg also contributed features and columns, winning Montana Newspaper Association awards for best news story in 1988 and best humorous column in 1991.

While Fugleberg was winning awards for humor, he was facing his own personal tragedy. Mary Lou Erickson, after more than 15 years struggling with illness, died in February 1996. Fugleberg said she kept working as a typesetter for the Leader until the night she checked into the hospital. A few days later, she died.

In the wake of her death, Fugleberg fought grief by working on his defining work, Proud Heritage: An illustrated history of Lake County, the lower Flathead, Mission and Jocko valleys. He dedicated it to her.

"Dearly loved, sorely missed — but her memory is ever present…" Fugleberg wrote.

Fugleberg continued contributing to the Leader. Fugleberg came out of semi-retirement as a full-time copyeditor in 2002. His son, Tom, said it was difficult for Fugleberg to pry himself away from his work after a heart attack this month.

"You can have a job and you can have a vocation," Tom said. "It was the defining part of his life, and that's a little more potent than somebody who's had a great, long career."

Generous Spirit

Despite the praises of his friends and family, Fugleberg has always been modest. He said he doesn't think his life merits a newspaper story or a big retirement party, which his friends are throwing for him June 1 from 2-4 p.m. at Linderman Elementary School. Fugleberg said he has met incredible people, like Merrill Womack, who records his own voice dozens of times onto the same soundtrack to create a forty-man chorus. He started singing after his plane crashed and left burn scars all over his body. A sculptor, inspired by Womack's gift, created a sculpture out of parts of the crashed airplane.

The people he wrote about were the heroes, Fugleberg said. "I just did what was expected."

Karen Lewing, one of Fugleberg's friends, disagrees. She worked as an advertising representative with the newspaper and also with Fugleberg in community theater.

"He knew what made a community a community," she said. And despite being quiet offstage, when the spotlight was on, Fugleberg sang and acted with the best of them.

When one part required him to wear a burglar's mask, Fugleberg said he couldn't see and put on his "trademark" coke bottle glasses over the mask, Lewing said, causing the entire cast to crack up during rehearsal. The practice had to be canceled because the cast couldn't stop laughing.

Offstage, Fugleberg and Lewing were friends. Lewing said Fugleberg and Erickson helped her through the lean times, bringing by the occasional Christmas ham and being present after the birth of her children.

"He has always been there for anyone who needed him," she said.

Tom, his son, said that everyone feels that way, because Fugleberg has lived a life of patience, generosity and love.

"We're incredibly proud," he added. "For a guy who's crafted so many, many words for so many years, he rarely finds any to talk about himself."