By JIM BROOKS
Nelson County Gazette editor
Monday, Nov. 24, 2025– I can’t help but borrow a lyric from the classic Grateful Dead song “Truckin’ ” given the fact that this website — the Nelson County Gazette — has been truckin’ for more than 20 years.
Recent events and the nature of this there-again, gone-again website have prompted me to realize its time to “Turn The Page,” (another lyrical reference, this time from a 1970s Bob Seger song) on the “old” Gazette, and launch a new version of the Nelson County Gazette.
And sadly, as a result, I have been forced to turn my back on 15 years of archived news content the previous site housed. The decision to do so was not an easy one.
The site was hosted for many years by a ham radio friend of mine in Henderson who operated a successful IT and computer business. However, in recent years, my friend ended up accepting a job in Henderson County government.
While I have yet to know exactly what’s happened, I do know the results — the Gazette has been offline for weeks at a time twice since early summer this year. Text messages and phone calls to my friend failed to get the issue resolved. Its mostly been radio silence from my old friend.
The damned truth is I am still in the dark in regards to what happened why my site continued to be missing in action.
The first time the site was MIA early this summer, I started a hosting account and began building (with the help and advice of my talented daughter, Katie) a new, prototype website that evolved into version of the Gazette you’re seeing today.
Prior to my decision to move on, it was a struggle to avoid calling up my friend and screaming at him. As the man who controlled hosting of the old Gazette, he also held the keys to my access to 15 years of archived stories in his hands.
If I called him up and vented my frustration, he could easily have ignored me, or worse, deleted the archives I wanted so desperately to preserve. Instead of giving him down the road, I took a far less confrontational route. That meant polite texts that avoided making fiery demands. My pleas for help were phrased as gentle appeals for intervention.
The truth is that he has — for most of the last 15 years — treated me great. The honest truth is that he’s been a great business partner until earlier this year. During the outages, I have stuck with him in hopes he would have time to get my website issues.
Unfortunately, this time around, that shit got me nowhere. And it was time to make a move.
And moving forward is a two-edged sword. I’m celebrating the site’s return, while subsequently mourning the loss of thousands of articles and photos from the past. As silly as it might sound, for a journalist, the pain has been like losing a member of my family.
Change is inevitable — even when that change is hoisted on us as an unwelcome event. I’m no stranger to change, or the pain that comes with losing years of hard work.
And yes, I’m elated the “new” Gazette is live, but the loss still weighs heavy on my heart. One of the most difficult lessons in life I’ve learned was best summed up in a quote attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson: “Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood.”
And so forward we move …. on to the next events, stories and photos that when woven together, makes up the fabric of our lives.
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