Charles W. Kelly To Retire; Reporter, Editor, Publisher Set Standard For 56 Years

OGDENSBURG - Charles W. Kelly likes to introduce himself as "the largest paperboy in St. Lawrence County."

He often says it as a joke, but for the past 56 years, the publisher and editor of newspapers in Ogdensburg, Massena, Potsdam, Canton and Malone has delivered more than his share of papers after hours and on weekends when the delivery staff has gone home.

"I've always done that. I just adopted a policy a long time ago that If they got me on the phone, I would deliver it," he says. "Most publishers don't go out and deliver newspapers."

Most publishers also don't chase ambulances or police cars.

But since joining the staff of The Ogdensburg Journal and Sunday Advance News as a sophomore in high school as a part-time sportswriter, the 76-year-old Mr. Kelly has been covering the news and chasing stories wherever they led him.

"I liked it," he says, recalling his first days in the newspaper business. "I was nosy. I liked it a lot. I've never considered myself a publisher. I considered myself a working editor."

One year, he recalls, there were 38 fatal accidents - and he was reporting from the scene of 26 of them.

On Sept. 10, Mr. Kelly will retire his duties as publisher and take on a part-time role with Johnson Newspaper Corp.'s St. Lawrence County Newspapers division, which includes The Journal, Advance News, Daily Courier-Observer in Massena and Potsdam and The Telegram in Malone. He will continue writing his popular "Kelly's Comments" and "Glance at the Past" columns in the Advance News.

CHANGING WITH THE TIMES

In September, business, production staff and some other Johnson Newspaper employees will move into a new, consolidated office in Canton. Mr. Kelly says that the move will reduce costs, while allowing staff at the St. Lawrence County Newspapers - including the St. Lawrence County staff of the Watertown Daily Times, also a Johnson newspaper - to focus on covering their local communities.

The Journal's newsroom staff and advertising representatives will remain in Ogdensburg.

"During the current difficult economy, all companies have had to find ways to become more efficient. We're no different," Mr. Kelly says. "But this move will allow The Journal, Advance News, St. Lawrence Plaindealer and Daily Courier-Observer to continue serving their communities into the next century."

John B. Johnson Jr., editor and co-publisher of the Times, had high praise for Mr. Kelly.

"The words 'Chuck Kelly' and 'north country journalism' are synonymous," he says. "Chuck Kelly is fiercely proud of his profession. He has withstood pressures from innumerable people who thought their personal version of the truth was what Chuck should publish in his newspapers, not the version of a story Chuck ferreted away from secretive people.

"Chuck defended Ogdensburg, Massena and St. Lawrence County from political back-room deals," he continues. "Chuck Kelly never turned his back on a news story."

Mr. Johnson says Mr. Kelly "never skipped a chance to promote Ogdensburg and the people who made it home. He was dogged in his efforts to establish the prisons in the city and to protect those prisons from political efforts to close them. He knew that the prisons' jobs provided sustenance to so many north country families."

Mr. Kelly's efforts helped convince the state earlier this year to keep Ogdensburg Correctional Facility open.

"Chuck always spoke his mind," Mr. Johnson says. "Chuck may be retiring from day-to-day journalism, but his knowledge of the community and his distinct dedication to the truth will continue to be a part of north country newspapers."

'A SELF-MADE MAN'

Mr. Kelly grew up as the sixth of 10 children. His younger brother, Timothy E. Kelly, a retired Watertown businessman, recalls how his 15-year-old brother bought him his first Boy Scout uniform from the money he earned selling newspapers and cigars at O'Connor and Algie's store at Ford Street and State Street.

"Chuck is a self-made man," Timothy Kelly says. "He came out of the Army and built a life-long career with the Ogdensburg newspapers."

Timothy Kelly says that, with eight siblings who are Democrats and two who are Republicans, "it made for some interesting conversations around the dinner table" when the Kelly clan gathered.

After graduating from St. Mary's Academy in 1954, Mr. Kelly worked as a sports writer and general assignment reporter before serving a three-year stint in the U.S. Army.

When he returned from overseas duty in France and Germany, Mr. Kelly came back to work for the newspaper.

"I went into the service with the idea that I would get the educational benefits when I got out. I got out Jan. 10. I was going to go to Potsdam State, but it was too late for that semester," he recalls. "My old friend Napoleon Beauchamp said, 'Why don't you come back to The Journal?'"

Mr. Kelly resumed working at the newspaper and never left, rising through the ranks at the company.

"When I came to work for the newspaper, it was still in the hot-metal days," he recalls. "There was a big pot of hot lead in the pressroom and it was kept at 600 degrees at all times."

Mr. Kelly says he learned a great deal from the late Franklin R. Little, the former publisher and owner of the newspaper.

"He was good to work for," Mr. Kelly says. "I always like to say I graduated from the Franklin R. Little School of Hard Knocks."

Mr. Little and the late Frank Gannett, founder of the Gannett newspaper chain that includes USA Today, bought The Journal in 1928. Mr. Gannett was the majority owner, but Mr. Little later bought him out.

Mr. Little expanded the company, buying the Advance-News from the late Joseph R. Brandy Sr., the Massena Observer, the Potsdam Courier-Freeman and Canton's St. Lawrence Plaindealer.

While Mr. Little was a strong Republican, he decided to keep the Advance-News as an outspoken Democratic newspaper.

"It was a business decision," Mr. Kelly says. "Legal advertising was designated by the political parties."

By keeping the Advance-News as a Democratic newspaper, the newspaper received tens of thousands of dollars in legal advertising, while The Journal and the other papers received the Republican legal advertising.

Mr. Kelly says that his Democratic registration helped him succeed Advance-News Editor Henry Belgard, who wrote the front page Sunday column "Up and Down Fordway."

"I think I was the only other Democrat in the room," Mr. Kelly says.

Mr. Kelly renamed the column "Kelly's Comments," which continues today as a strong voice for Democratic causes.

A DEMOCRATIC CHAMPION

In the 1960s and 1970s, Mr. Kelly says he delighted in championing Democratic statewide candidates at a time when most upstate newspapers were Republican.

Retired St. Lawrence County Court Judge Eugene L. Nicandri remembers meeting the controversial newspaper editor in 1966, shortly after he had moved to Massena in 1965.

Massena was in the midst of its battle to establish municipal power. The Massena Observer was skeptical about whether Massena should pursue its own electric department.

Mr. Kelly was an outspoken supporter of Massena's efforts to establish its municipal electric department.

"It was helpful in making people a little more attuned to the pro side," Judge Nicandri recalls.

Mr. Kelly's editorial support of Democratic candidates in those days "helped ensure that they were not immediately dismissed out of hand," Judge Nicandri recalls. "His endorsements helped even the playing field. Back in those days, the county was almost 3 to 1 Republican."

"On the state level, Democratic candidates running statewide would come up here because they knew Chuck," Judge Nicandri recalls. "He would tell them you can't just write the area off. Hillary Clinton is a good example. She came up, worked the area, and won. Chuck showed Democratic candidates that they should not just rely on the New York City vote."

Ernest J. LaBaff, retired president emeritus of the Aluminum, Brick, Glass Workers International Union, and a former vice president of the AFL-CIO, says Mr. Kelly played a crucial role in promoting a viable two-party system at a time when Democrats were few and far between.

"Chuck and I go way back to the early days, when I was starting out in organized labor," Mr. LaBaff recalls. "Years ago, Chuck had a lot of guts endorsing Democrats. We were not the majority party."

When Mr. LaBaff ran for the U.S. Congress as a Democratic candidate in 1972, the Advance News was one of the only newspapers that supported his candidacy.

Mr. LaBaff says that, for Democrats four decades ago, knowing that they could count on support from Kelly's Comments and an endorsement from the Advance News helped convince some to wage long-shot campaigns in the heavily Republican north country.

Mr. Kelly's outspoken support for Democratic statewide candidates even drew the attention of the White House in the early 1960s, when then Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy was eying a race for New York Senator.

Mr. Kennedy's staff made sure that Ogdensburg was an early campaign stop, which led to a close personal relationship with the young newspaper editor.

"Bobby Kennedy asked me to consider running for the state Democratic committee," Mr. Kelly recalls.

The senator made several visits to Ogdensburg and was instrumental in obtaining federal funding for Ogdensburg's port.

After Senator Kennedy was assassinated, his family invited Mr. Kelly to attend the funeral.

As a member of the state Democratic Committee in the 1960s, Mr. Kelly met numerous Democrats who in the years to come rose to key positions in the state government.

KEEPING POLITICIANS HONEST

Mr. Kelly also used his column to promote Republican challengers to the status quo.

In those days, before Freedom of Information Laws existed, Mr. Kelly points out, local governments and county government operated in secrecy, closing committee meetings to the public.

Committee meetings of the St. Lawrence County Board of Supervisors - the predecessor of the county legislature - were even closed to members of the board of supervisors unless they were members of the committee or invited by the committee chair to attend.

Mr. Kelly says he would use his column and editorials to raise questions to force elected officials to explain to their constituents what they were doing.

It didn't always make him popular, he concedes. But it often earned him the grudging respect of those he covered.

Mr. Kelly's columns in the Advance News often served as the launching point for critics of what was happening behind the closed doors of local governments to make their case, Judge Nicandri recalls. "He spurred a lot of public debate."

The people running county government were a "pretty tight group" in the 1960s and 1970s, Judge Nicandri says, and few people wanted to publicly challenge their decisions.

"You couldn't get a job in county government, whether it was the sheriff's department, highway department or social services unless you were on the right side of the political spectrum," he says.

But Mr. Kelly never shied away from poking around to raise questions no one wanted to answer.

Some of his biggest public critics were often his best confidential sources, Mr. Kelly says.

During a hospital board meeting, a former chair once warned fellow board members to make sure that none of them "told Kelly" about a confidential report.

By the end of the day, Mr. Kelly recalls, he had received several, including the chair's personal copy.

LENDING A HAND

When people and communities in Northern New York needed help, Mr. Kelly could often reach out to enlist their help.

In the 1970s, the state had begun closing buildings at the St. Lawrence Psychiatric Center because the century-old structures did not meet code.

Mr. Kelly took on the job as co-chair with the late Frank A. Augsbury Jr. of Project BUILD (Be United In Local Development). Project BUILD was responsible for spearheading the community effort in the late 1970s to have the 304-bed Trinity building built at the St. Lawrence Psychiatric Center.

State officials had targeted the hospital for closure, but the committee was able to convince candidate and then-Gov. Hugh Carey to build the Trinity building, saving the psychiatric center from closure.

Last year, he chaired a community drive to save the Ogdensburg Correctional Facility after it was placed on a state closure list. The campaign succeeded in putting the prison back in the state budget. Both major party candidates for governor, Democrat Andrew M. Cuomo and Republican Rick A. Lazio, have publicly promised to keep the prison open if they are elected.

'HIGH STANDARD OF INTEGRITY'

Pam Moore-Erickson, a staff officer at the U.S. Department of Defense and former newspaper reporter, jokes that Mr. Kelly "ruined me for life."

"He taught me to speak the truth and expect others to do the same," she recalls. "Chuck held his reporters to a high standard of integrity and objectivity in their work. He expected us to ask direct questions of our city leaders and would not tolerate evasive answers. Chuck taught me two critical life lessons: first, speak truth to power - he'll be happy to know former City Engineer Ross Germano was not the last person to throw me out of his office - and second, all politics really are local. The local journalist must, above all else, be the voice of the local citizen."

Those values were recognized by his peers in the newspaper industry.

In 1968, the New York Press Association awarded Kelly's Comments first place for column writing.

In 1979, Mr. Kelly and former Managing Editor James Kennedy won first place for depth reporting from the New York State Associated Press for their coverage of con artist James Gokey's scheme to bilk elderly retirees out of their savings in Lake Placid.

In 1986, Mr. Kelly, Managing Editor James E. Reagen and former reporter Michael Hirsch won first place from the New York State Associated Press for depth reporting about St. Lawrence County Social Services handling of foster care.

In 1990, Mr. Kelly and Mr. Reagen won second place for depth reporting from the New York Associated Press for articles detailing the handling of a police investigation of a sergeant accused of burglarizing local businesses.

AN EMPHASIS ON JOBS

While Mr. Kelly takes pride in the quality of the newspaper's reporting, he also used his role to help bring new jobs to the area.

Richard G. Lockwood served as mayor of Ogdensburg from 1980 to 2000.

"I knew Chuck when he was at St. Mary's Academy. He was two years ahead of me," Mr. Lockwood recalls. "You either love Chuck, kind of love Chuck or you hate Chuck. Chuck made enemies because he would always take a clear stand and some people wouldn't like that."

"But even people who didn't like him had to respect him," Mr. Lockwood says. "You always knew he always had the best interest of St. Lawrence County at heart."

"Chuck had contacts everywhere," Mr. Lockwood says. "He could open doors."

When the governor proposed closing Ogdensburg Correctional Facility last year, "who did they turn to chair the task force to keep it open?" Mr. Lockwood asks. "They turned to Chuck."

In 1982, with the state continuing to cut staff at the St. Lawrence Psychiatric Center, Mr. Kelly teamed up with state Sen. H. Douglas Barclay, R-Pulaski, to locate a prison in Ogdensburg.

At the time, state officials had had eggs and vegetables pelted at them in Long Island for proposing a prison at Pilgrim Psychiatric Center.

With the state facing a crack cocaine epidemic, then-Gov. Mario Cuomo was looking for locations for new prisons.

When Ogdensburg offered to accept a prison, the Department of Corrections changed its policy, deciding it would only consider locations where community leaders had voted to accept a prison.

Former Ogdensburg Correctional Facility Superintendent John (Jack) R. O'Keefe says he can remember during his first visit to Ogdensburg before the Department of Corrections had announced that he would be overseeing the proposed prison, he received a phone call at his motel.

Mr. Kelly had not only been tipped off by sources in the Department of Corrections that Mr. O'Keefe was slated for the Ogdensburg post, but he'd also been told where he was staying.

Mr. O'Keefe says the Department of Corrections had developed a strong relationship with the newspaper editor.

"Corrections couldn't believe there was a community that actually wanted a prison," Mr. O'Keefe recalls.

But when they realized that there was no opposition in Ogdensburg, corrections officials developed a close relationship with the newspaper editor.,

"People wanted to bring the jobs here," Mr. O'Keefe recalls. "When I came to Ogdensburg, I didn't sense any opposition."

Sen. Barclay says a lot of his fellow Republicans had trouble understanding his relationship with the outspoken Democratic newspaper editor.

"He always treated me fairly," Sen. Barclay recalls. "You always knew what was on his mind."

'I WANT ANOTHER ONE'

In 1986, during a trip to Albany, Mr. Kelly and Mr. Reagen were standing on a street corner near the state capitol when a limousine pulled up and the window rolled down.

Gov. Cuomo yelled, "Chuck! Chuck! Did you hear my State of the State message? I proposed Ogdensburg as a location for one of my "Opportunity Zones."

"I want a prison," Mr. Kelly recalls responding.

"You have a prison," the governor responded.

"I want another one," Mr. Kelly said. "And I'll take one of those zones too."

The "zone" became an "Empire Zone" and initially was one of only a handful upstate. Economic development officials say it played a key role in helping to attract businesses to Ogdensburg's industrial park.

Gov. Cuomo and former New York City Mayor Edward I. Koch helped Ogdensburg win Riverview Correctional Facility, which originally was a New York City jail, staffed by state corrections employees. Mr. Koch had been unable to find a place in New York city where he could locate the prison without massive neighborhood opposition.

Mr. Kelly says that he never knew when someone he helped in his column might become an ally for the north country.

When former Congressman David O'B. Martin of Canton launched his successful bid for congress, Mr. Kelly promoted a little known Republican challenger, Oswego Assemblyman John R. Zagame. Mr. Zagame had angered the Republican establishment by challenging fellow Assemblyman Martin. Under the old boy system, Mr. Martin had seniority. But Mr. Kelly says he provided extensive coverage of Mr. Zagame's uphill struggle to force a discussion of the issues in the GOP primary.

Several years later, when Canton's nursing home was facing bankruptcy and United Helpers had been asked to assume ownership, Mr. Kelly was asked to help obtain federal assistance to assist the not-for-profit agency arrange financing. He called a staff member of Sen. Alfonse D'Amato, R-N.Y., who told him they would need to convince the senator's new staff director.

"It turned out to be John Zagame," Mr. Kelly recalls. "John was instrumental in helping us get a meeting in Washington."

WIELDING INFLUENCE

Mr. Kelly was never shy about using his contacts to help people who had no where else to turn. When he heard about a local family whose child needed an operation, he enlisted the assistance of then-Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y. Mrs. Clinton opened the right door for the boy's family.

While Mr. Kelly has often been accused of favoring too many Democrats, some of his fellow Democrats have accused him of being too partial to Republicans.

"I've taken a lot of heat for supporting Republicans," he says. But he praises former Senator Barclay, former Rep. John McHugh, former Sen. D'Amato and others who were always responsive when they were asked to help communities in St. Lawrence County.

"You always knew where Chuck Kelly stood on any issue," recalls Mr. McHugh, now secretary of the Army. "Chuck's opinions have long set the agenda for conversation and debate throughout the region. Whether you agreed with Chuck or not, he would always give you an open ear and fair shot. And, at the end of the day, the things he cared most about - his two true passions - were the newspaper he loved and the city he called home."

Former New York State Democratic Party Chairman June F. O'Neill, who now serves as the party's executive committee chair, calls the newspaper publisher an "institution."

Mrs. O'Neill says Mr. Kelly played an important role in the 1960s and early 1970s "when you couldn't find a Democrat (in northern New York) with a search warrant."

"Probably his biggest impact was in getting people interested in the races by agreeing with them or disagreeing with them," she says. "I think a lot of people listened to what he had to say. Sometimes we agreed, sometimes we disagreed, but you never had to guess what he was thinking."

"Chuck always gave people a fair shake," she says. "He was always up front He didn't say one thing to your face and something else behind your back. I value that."

Mr. Kelly says that he's always seen his role as someone who forces a public discussion of the issues facing the community, even when elected officials might prefer to avoid it.

He's also willing to spend years championing what may at first be an unpopular position until he can educate the community and win support for it.

"I fought for 10 years to bring the council-manager form of government to Ogdensburg,' he says.

When the U.S. Postal Service closed Ogdensburg's historic State Street Post Office, Mr. Kelly launched a 13-year campaign to reverse the decision.

Thanks to then Congressman McHugh, former State Sen. James Wright and U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY), the U.S. Postal Service reversed its decision and rehabilitated the State Street building.

"Any time there was a good cause or someone was down and out, we would fight for them," he says. "We would not always win them, but we would give it a good fight."

Mr. Kelly says that his position has allowed him to help his hometown.

"I didn't stay the first 40 years for the money they were paying me," he says.

"It has become so clear to me since my arrival in Ogdensburg several years ago, that the City of Ogdensburg has had no greater ambassador than Chuck Kelly," says Most. Rev. Bishop Terry R. LaValley, bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Ogdensburg. "From his earliest days as a journalist, Chuck's deep love for the north country and Ogdensburg, in particular, has been evident for all to see and to appreciate. While I have not always agreed with Chuck on some important issues, I have found him and (his wife) Therese to be tremendous sources of support. They are cherished friends. Chuck's life story is a love story of a man and his community."

COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT

Over the years, Mr. Kelly and others served on a committee to help found the Ogdensburg Boys and Girls Club. He has been a longtime promoter of the Ogdensburg Volunteer Rescue Squad and volunteer fire departments across the county.

In 1959, he began chairing the Ogdensburg Recreation Commission. They developed skating rinks on Ogden Street in the Second Ward, at St. Peter's Square and Winter Park.

"I used to help flood them at night," he recalls.

"We put picnic tables in the parks. The fire department would build them. We put playgrounds in the parks. We'd get local contractors and talented private citizens to help us," he recalls.

When the Pythian Beach closed, Mr. Kelly, was chairman of the recreation commission. They opened a new beach at the Ogdensburg Bridge and Port Authority, convincing local contractors to help and local truckers to haul sand to the beach. The sand was donated.

Mr. Kelly says he appreciates the editorial freedom that the owners of the newspaper have given him during his career. He has provided the same editorial freedom to his editors at The Journal, the St. Lawrence Plaindealer and the Daily Courier-Observer.

Daily Courier-Observer Managing Editor Ryne Martin says he has been the beneficiary of Mr. Kelly's policy of allowing local editors to decide their paper's editorial policy.

"I would be a rich man if I had a dollar for every time someone has suggested Chuck was responsible for something either being in the newspaper or not being in the newspaper," Mr. Martin says. "But in reality Chuck understood that the integrity of our community newspapers hinged on allowing the editors in those communities to make the day to day decisions on editorial stances.

"Anybody that knows Chuck knows there are four certainties in his life. He is Irish, he is from Ogdensburg, he was a Purple Eagle at St. Mary's and he is a staunch Democrat," Mr. Martin says. "But when it came to endorsements at election time, Chuck always let the editors of the various papers make their own endorsements. His only demand was that the editors had a rationale for selecting the candidate they endorsed. That didn't mean there weren't some lively discussions - with smiles on our faces - from time to time about the various candidates earning our endorsements."

That hands-off approach helped pave the way for the merger of the weekly Potsdam Courier-Freeman and biweekly Massena Observer into the Daily Courier-Observer, recalls Mr. Martin, who was on the company's editorial board in the 1980s.

"It was a tremendous opportunity for a young editor at that time in his mid- to late-20s," he says. "I was given great freedom in designing the paper that has now been on the streets for the past two decades and had a tremendous sounding board during the development of the product as he used his experience in journalism to take those ideas, make some improvements and provide the area with a strong, vibrant community newspaper. He didn't tell us what to put in the newspaper; he just wanted to be sure that we understood the importance of chronicling life in the communities we cover."

Mr. Kelly says he looks forward to focusing on his column and stepping back from the day-to-day responsibilities of overseeing the Malone, Ogdensburg, Massena and Canton newspapers.

"I've worked for several owners, but I have to say John Johnson Jr. has been the best to work with," he says. "He has been very, very good to the employees."

While Mr. Kelly says the newspapers are facing challenges and changes, he says he's confident they'll continue their tradition of serving their communities.