It's a curse, according to my wife and son, who are sure I'll never get through all my boxes of saved stuff during my lifetime and that they'll be stuck with finishing the job.

It's a blessing, according to me, because I've been able to successfully digitize and preserve a piece of the past: 30 year old news stories and complete newscasts aired on North Dakota television stations.

Best of all, I've gone from dozens of boxes of 3/4-inch videotapes down to just four external hard drives of video data. Same stuff. Same quality. Smaller size. A packrat's dream.

So, what you have here at this site are 50 of my favorite news stories drawn from the hundreds I wrote, edited and saved during my broadcast news days in North Dakota.

Each story features its broadcast date, the TV station on which it aired, a brief summary and some commentary by me about the context or production of the story. Where possible, I've also included support material, such as the script I wrote and used to put the story together and any press releases or other information used in shaping the story.

Were you ever featured in one of my stories? You can use the small search engine to find out -- it searches a database of all the stories I've digitized, not just the 50 shown online. If you find a story you'd like to see that isn't among the featured 50, you can e-mail me from the site and I'll add it to the public collection.

Keep in mind that, since these are stories I did, they represent North Dakota people, places and events during the 1980s as seen through my eyes and reporting skills. Since I favored feature reporting, you're getting one slice of the times, not a complete overview. You'll find more average people here than politicians. Fewer stories about folks embroiled in scandal and more about kids in school.

If you have any questions or comments about this site, let me know via e-mail and I'll answer where I can.

Enjoy.