Column: Thank you, Anthony

By Jon Dykstra | February 1, 2024 |

SUBMITTED
Anthony Crane covers a North Nodaway at East Atchison basketball game on Tuesday in Fairfax.

I’ve told this story countless times to friends and colleagues, but when I had my first interview for a job at a newspaper, I was nervous — as anyone going into a job interview is.

I had no journalism experience or schooling, and had just graduated from Missouri Western with a Sports Management degree. I had no idea what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, but I knew I wanted to be involved with sports.

My interview was with St. Joseph News-Press sports editor Ross Martin — one of the best journalists I’ll ever work with. But it was late in the afternoon and Ross had games to get to.

He took me into a conference room at the News-Press and immediately asked something to the effect of ‘do you love sports?’ I said yes — thinking that was just small talk to begin the interview. He responded by telling me when I’d start and left because he had to get to a game.

That interview taught me two things. 1. This business is chaotic and you better be ready to embrace being busy. 2. Having a great writing style and perfect grammar is great, but having a passion for what you do and being willing to jump in with two feet is what is going to make or break you.

That is what has been my main driver in this job. My writing often needs a good spell checker — avid reader and volunteer editor Kenneth Hamilton can attest to that. I’m still a novice photographer who snaps enough to get lucky most nights with something workable.

But I try to have more knowledge on our teams than anyone and be at more things than anyone. I look for that hustle whenever we get the chance to add to our team and it is the quality I respect most in fellow journalists.

That is why working with Anthony Crane has been such a blessing. As a part-time employee for the Maryville Forum and eventually the Grant City Times-Tribune, there is nobody I trusted more to bounce thoughts and opinions off of when it came to local sports because he cares about it and follows everything.

The amount of content Anthony has produced for us and other outlets over the years has been staggering for a guy working one or two nights a week. He doesn’t do that because he was getting rich off doing it. He does it because he loves it.

The guy is passionate about local sports, kids and journalism. There is not a better combination to have in this business.

That’s why we are going to miss him at the Forum and Times-Tribune.

Over the years, you may have noticed that I’ll submit photos or videos to other media outlets in the area. This probably isn’t smart from a cut-throat business perspective, but as I said earlier, I know how chaotic this profession is and that people can’t be everywhere at once, and kids outside of Nodaway and Worth County deserve coverage too. And I only do it for outlets and/or journalists I think are doing all they can for their coverage area.

The outlet I have probably helped the most is KQ2 in St. Joseph because I have seen the dedication and hard work that Chris Roush and his staff put into local coverage of their massive coverage area.

It is no surprise to me that Chris probably has similar things he looks for in employees as what I do. With Chris stepping into KQ2’s News Director role, they had a full-time opening on the sports side and he made an ideal hire in the form of Anthony.

In addition to Anthony’s work for us, he’s helped build Missouri8-ManFootball.com and helped give the Savannah Reporter sports coverage. Again, he didn’t do these things because of the money, he did them because he wanted to give the kids, who wouldn’t otherwise get it, the shine they deserve.

But Anthony deserves some shine too. Few are as dedicated to this business and sports in northwest Missouri as that guy is and I’m excited for St. Joseph because he is going to be able to bring that passion to his hometown full time.

While I’m going to miss working directly with Anthony, I’m excited to bring another journalist into our Forum/Times-Tribune family. We are going to continue to try and be the leader for local sports content and with Anthony helping steer the ship in St. Joseph, this only makes sports media in northwest Missouri stronger.

Congratulations Anthony, and thank you.