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IronwoodInfo Begins Third Year! |
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| On September 10, 2007 IronwoodInfo.com became a new source of
news and events for residents of the Western Upper Peninsula. Originally we
planned to be alternative news source to the daily glob. As time passed it
became obvious that there is life outside Ironwood’s Memorial Building and our
coverage quickly expanded to Ontonagon County and then on to Baraga and Houghton
Counties.
The scope of our coverage changed from covering the politics of the city to covering news and events that had a more enduring appeal. We covered parades, art shows, and music concerts. We’ve covered all but one County Fair in our coverage area and we intend to cover that county fair in 2010. We have brought our readers to festivals, auto shows and sporting events. We’ve covered events from Marquette to Duluth. IronwoodInfo reporters have covered all of our local schools and colleges. At one time or another in the past two years we have covered every school district in the GOISD. We enjoy the coverage we provide our local students, from planting flower seeds and plants to competing in the Quiz Bowls, their band concerts their parades and their fundraisers. This year we dabbled in covering Junior High sports, coverage which we intend to expand in 2010. We attempt to provide equal coverage to the large school districts and the little school districts, and we support them all. In addition to covering school events we report on monthly school board meetings and the latest news effecting our district. We don't attempt to candy coat the bad news either. A practice done by others in the past and one which left students and parents and teachers in the dark and unable to make informed decisions. As our readers know, we follow and honor our Veterans from every corner of the Western U.P. on a year round basis. It’s been an equally wonderful experience covering our area’s firefighters at work and at play. We were the first media to provide coverage on the 2008 Ontonagon fire. While our reporters and photographers were on the scene before sunrise our editor was uploading the first photo coverage to hit the Internet. Our small size and flexibility allowed us to report on the fire and its victims days before our muscle-bound competition. We have followed our firefighters to two U.P. Tournaments and several picnics. We have followed them into salvage yards and climbed on top of junked cars in order to give our readers a glimpse of our firefighter’s training. While we report news, we hope to accomplish more than just that. Last year we traveled over 50,000 miles scurrying from event to event, wearing out cars not just tires. There were days when we would cover a Wastewater Authority meeting at 8:00 am in Ironwood, a meeting the same afternoon in Ontonagon and finish the day covering an art exhibit in Hancock. We want our readers to experience all the wonderful things that are a part of our western upper peninsula.
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This year we expanded our coverage to Gogebic Community
College, a corner stone of our community. Next year we will increase our
collegiate coverage both in scope and area. We’re still in the learning
stage and hope to grow bigger and better in the year ahead. We intend to
remain a nonprofit corporation in order to continue our news with a
view. Our investigative coverage is very much alive and well. When we
report on a political meeting, we attempt to report on the story within
the story, not just an early edition of the meetings minutes.
While we appreciate the easy to publish press releases, we are proud of the fact that we have reported on most of the events for which we have published earlier as press releases. The few times that we haven’t been able to provide the coverage is when we haven’t had enough people to cover all of the conflicting events. In the past two years we have reported on over a thousand events and published thousands of photographs. We’re not resting on our laurels. Being the area’s most widely read news source is not enough either. We have plans to expand our coverage next year and have under consideration the purchase of another regional on-line news paper and a weekly print paper. These acquisitions are in preliminary stages and may not materialize at all. Sometimes these acquisitions take a great deal of time to close. We’ll post updates from time to time. We at IronwoodInfo really enjoy bringing news and events to our readers and we hope that our readers enjoy what we publish. We're already into year three, hang on for the ride! Thanks to Linda and Arvo for all their effort! Lou Bonagura |
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IronwoodInfo is Two Years Old A couple years ago as Lou Bonagura
became
bored with "retirement", an idea for a computer website was forming in
his mind. Lou is not one to sit idle very long.....he started the "Ironwoodinfo.com"
website with topics of interest in Gogebic County.....but having
purchased recreational property in White Pine, Michigan....the coverage
soon spread to Ontonagon County. Not one to set limitations, Lou then
got Arvo Toolanen and Linda Graham to join the news crew and soon spread
to include Baraga and Houghton Counties. Over these past two years Arvo
and Lou have become known at monthly meetings, annual celebrations, and
all activities in between. Between Lou, Arvo and Linda, "Ironwood Info"
has covered Christmas Festivals; Labor Day activities; Veteran's
activities; the Ontonagon Fire of September, 2008; basketball, football,
track, etc.; Linda Graham Ironwoodinfo is two years old! I find this hard to believe. Time has gone by so quickly. We think the Western UP is quiet and too remote for too much activity, but being involved with all the area people from so many locations around us has proved me wrong. We can find so many different events and functions going on that anyone would be happy and proud to get involved with people sharing interests with the various communities just within short scenic trips at various times of year. We can enjoy solitude in a beautiful area like this or be happy interacting with so many diverse people: elderly , active senior and hard working adults, to great college students of various ages and all the kids being brought up in our area. Thank you for all your hard and insightful work Lou! Arvo Toolanen
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