Crane, Rice join Forum editorial team

By Geoffrey Woehlk | March 12, 2026 |

Anthony Crane Sports Editor

MARYVILLE, Mo. — Starting with this week’s newspaper, The Forum welcomes two veterans of northwest Missouri journalism to the team: Anthony Crane and Kathryn Rice.

Crane takes over as The Forum’s sports editor for Jon Dykstra, who is now the newspaper’s managing editor. And Rice, formerly a news reporter for the Nodaway News Leader, will serve in the same role with The Forum.

Crane

Crane returns to The Forum, where he has worked as a freelance sports stringer frequently since 2018. He has spent his journalism career so far steeped in northwest Missouri sports at The Forum and the Grant City Times-Tribune, the Mound City News, the Savannah Reporter and, most recently, at KQTV in St. Joseph.

Returning to newspapers, he said, is like coming home.

“My love for newspapers started further back than I can remember,” he said. “I always like to joke that’s how I learned how to read. So that passion for it’s always been there.”

Working in television, Crane had new opportunities to cover bigger teams in bigger venues, like the Kansas City Chiefs and the Super Bowl. But covering the sports that mean so much to the small communities they’re a part of adds a dimension that can’t be found anywhere else, Crane said.

“The downside is, the further up you go, the less people actually want you there,” he said. “… And so that, to me — it fulfills me a little bit, you know? Because if I’m not there to cover the Chiefs, hundreds of other outlets will be there. If I don’t get to a Platte Valley softball game, likely no one else will. And I think to me, that’s what I really enjoy most about it.”

At The Forum, Crane said he wants to uphold the quality of sports reporting the newspaper is known for.

“Often in life, my goal has always been to leave something better than the way I found it. And I think with the sports section of The Forum, it’s one of the few times where I’m like, ‘That’s gonna be hard to do,’” he said. “I don’t know if anyone’s as dedicated as Jon Dykstra has been to that sports section. But I hope I can strive to do what he’s done and keep that section as popular and well-maintained as it has been.”

Rice

Rice is a familiar face to readers and those in the communities she will continue to cover. In the Maryville area since 1979, Rice was a reporter at the Nodaway News Leader from 2013 until the paper closed last year.

Getting into journalism was a long time coming for Rice. She and her husband, Lewis, ran the Movie Magic video store in Maryville for nearly 25 years.

When Movie Magic went out of business in 2013, Rice said she was energized at the prospect of finally getting to put her mass communications degree to work telling people’s stories.

“I really love writing and talking to people,” she said. “I used to think I knew what was going on. Because when I had the video store, I talked to a lot of people and everything, and I found out that I just barely had my toe in the door — that there was so much more going on. And the newspaper world really opened that up. You’ve got a broader context of what is going on in your area, and things that are happening, and worthwhile causes — there are so many facets to everything, and it’s really amazing.”

Over the past 47 years, Rice has been very active in the community, and spends much of her time now dedicated to the Maryville Pride Lions Club. And anyone who has seen Rice around knows her other passion: motorcycles.

It didn’t start immediately. Her husband had been riding motorcycles since before they were married over 50 years ago, and encouraged her to try.

“Well, it was too tall for me,” Rice said. “I could not balance it. This was not good. So anyhow, that kinda scared me off.”

But about 33 years ago, they were at a friend’s house and she watched their 16-year-old daughter rolling around in their yard on a 250 Rebel.

“And I looked at that and I’m going, ‘Well that’s low to the ground. She can do it. I can do it,’” she said.

Because of arthritis, she’s traded in her bike for a trike, which will come out when the weather gets warmer.

“Keeps me on the road,” she said. “Keeps me riding.”

Rice said she’s excited to get back to work telling the stories of the people of Nodaway County.

“I love meeting people, I love finding out what story they need to express, to get out so that other people know what’s going on,” she said. “That was gonna be the hardest part about giving it up (when the News Leader closed), was the fact that I wasn’t going to be able to do that. It kind of gets in your blood. It really does. Just the interactions and everything and the fact that a lot of times, you’re helping people out — you’re giving them a voice that they might not otherwise have.”