field trip

A few of our favorite families got together yesterday for a field trip to our local newspaper, the Athens Banner-Herald. We gathered at 11 am and met up with the tour guide, who was very nice. We had 14 kids and 6 adults, so a pretty nice sized group for a tour. Jason even came from work to meet us, which is a treat for our kids because it is usually just me and them during the weekdays. Now that he has built up some vacation time to spare, he will be able to join us now and then for our outings, which is great not only because he gets to experience some cool stuff with us but also he is able to help with Lyle and Stella and I can enjoy myself a bit more with extra help.


My camera battery died halfway through our visit (DOH!) so I missed out on the group shot at the end of the tour and also the offices and old camera and other equipment that they used to use, but I did get some shots of the big press, which was very cool and the highlight of the tour I think.


We saw the presses from up above while they were not moving. Our guide talked to us about the paper, the ink, and the machinery.


Then we went downstairs to get a little closer to everything. This area is where the folded papers come out of the machines, and are then stacked and sorted and put together with the other sections of the paper.


Then we saw how the plates are made for each page of the paper, before being put into the press for printing.




We learned about how the 4 colors of ink combine to make full color photos in the newspaper, and how they have to adjust them all to line up properly since each color is printed onto the paper separately.


Then we went upstairs to watch as they started the presses up. It is very loud down in the press room so the workers wear ear protection and we had to be outside the glass.


They ran the press at a slow rate at first (which looked pretty fast to us!) while they made adjustments to the ink and alignment of the paper. Once everything was lined up right they turned the press up to full speed, and that was an amazing thing to see! The paper flew past and was cut and folded and out the other end in no time. It was very impressive.


Even the smallest kids in the group thought this part was pretty cool.


(Daisy and Bea had not seen each other in a few weeks so they were very happy to be together again! And look at Daisy's new haircut- she got bangs and some layers and I LOVE how it looks on her! Bea's new cut and color look awesome as well. I'm a sucker for some bright hair!)

Although I don't have photos, we also saw the circulation area, the reporters offices, and the old cut-and-paste area where they used to get the papers ready for printing back before the digital process which is now used. They used to manually piece together the page, then photograph it with very large cameras and then make the plates for the printing press from the negatives. Now they just send it straight from a computer down to the plate making room, so this whole area is now just for historical reference. We saw how they archive the papers into big books, and found out that we can go there to look up old newspapers if we ever need to. We heard about how the reporters are often out during the day getting their stories (the offices were pretty empty when we were there!) and saw where they sit to write up their articles in the evenings.

It was a great field trip- we learned a lot and had fun! Taking that crew into the Mellow Mushroom downtown afterward was a little crazy... but even that was lots of fun and the kids really do so well together. The big ones help with the little ones and everyone gets along. What a great group! Thank you all for a wonderful day. We love our homeschool family!!