JOHN CANNON: The man he came to respect

April 29, 2008 10:07 pm

— It was a frigid Saturday morning in January 1979 the day I first met Paul Sierer, the man who would be my boss for the next decade. I had arrived at what was then known as the Ashland Daily Independent that morning for a job interview that had been twice postponed by winter storms.
At the time, I was editor of the tri-weekly Examiner-News in Gallatin, Tenn., hoping to return to a daily newspaper as city editor of the Ashland paper. The weather was still harsh that weekend, and my family and I had not arrived in Ashland until 3 a.m. Thus, I had arrived for my 8 a.m. job interview with only a few hours of sleep in what was then known as the Henry Clay Motel. I had risen before daylight, dressed in the tiny bathroom and left my wife and two youngest children sleeping in the room.
However, before heading from the motel room that morning, I did something really dumb.
My eyes bothered me throughout my interview with Paul Sierer and assistant managing editor Russ Powell that morning. Not only was I tearing up, but I also was having trouble seeing clearly.
It was so bad that I concluded it had to be the air pollution for which Ashland had been notorious during my stint nine years earlier as a student English teacher at the old Coles Junior High School. The air quality was bothering me so much that morning I decided I could not take this job if it were offered to me.
When I returned to the motel room some four hours later, my wife asked, “Have your eyes been bothering you this morning?”
I told her that they sure had been and I was certain it was the air pollution.
“Well, maybe if you had your contacts on instead of mine, the pollution wouldn’t be so bad,” she said.
Sure enough, in my haste to get out of the room and to my interview without disturbing my family, I had put in the wrong contact lenses that morning. I switched to my contacts, and my eyes ceased to bother me.
Many time afterwards, Paul Sierer told me that I was one of his best hiring decisions. I always considered that a great compliment, but I never failed to add, “I also bet I’m the only candidate for a job who cried throughout the interview.”
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Fast forward more than 29 years. About a month ago, four of us old-timers here at The Independent — Mike Reliford, Stan Champer, Mark Maynard and me — traveled to Ironton to visit with Paul Sierer. It would be the final time I talked with the man I had come to respect and admire not just as a boss but as a friend.
I can’t speak for the other three, but I was personally nervous about the visit. Like the others, I knew Paul was terminally ill with cancer and had been given only a short time to live. I knew that it could be the last time any of us would speak to our old boss and mentor.
Within two minutes of arriving at Paul’s house, I knew that we had done the right thing. Paul immediately perked up as we shared stories and memories for several hours. There was lots of laughter and even a few tears, and Paul’s wife, Dottie, said we had really lifted up his spirits.
Well, he had also lifted my spirits. Instead of a man wallowing in self-pity, I visited an old friend that day who had accepted his fate, had made his peace with God and was ready — if not eager — to meet his maker.
As the four of us left that day, we made the usual promises to get by for another visit, but I never did. Paul died Saturday. His funeral Mass will be this morning.
I have just written about my first and last meeting with Paul Sierer. However, it was what happened between those meetings that is really important. I am a better journalist and, yes, a better person because of my years of association with Paul Sierer. Paul’s 81 years on Earth have ended, but a part of him continues to live on in the lives of the four of us who met with him that last time — and in the lives of the many others he touched.
JOHN CANNON can be reached at jcannon@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2649.