Story by Zach Avery, Editor-in-Chief

Photos courtesy of AQ Archives

With ‘The Saint’ returning to physical print issues (albeit, in a hybrid digital and physical format), we cannot help but feel a bit nostalgic. For so long (since its first issue on September 29, 1936) the Aquinas College student newspaper has served as a mode for expressing opinions and telling wonderful stories. We’ve been here throughout the most incredible moments of modern history: Reporting on events and forwarding our free press.

There may be no one more suited to speak on the impact the Aquinas student newspaper has had on our campus culture and history than Ryan Wendt of the Campus Safety offices. In the past year, Wendt has made it his studious goal to peruse every single issue of the paper. 

Every. Single. One.

“When I was a student in the 1990’s, I would always get an Aquinas newspaper to see what had been happening on campus,” Wendt said. “It was the main source of information before the internet. Most recently, last year, I was looking for a project to keep me busy during covid, so I decided to read and take notes on all 873 issues of the Aquinas newspaper starting from 1933. It took me 9 months to finally get through them all. I learned so many interesting things about Aquinas that I never would have learned otherwise. The newspapers are a wonderful resource for Aquinas history.”

How we receive and interpret communication naturally changes over time. However, there is certainly something very special about reading someone’s text from a physical magazine or newspaper. You see, read, and feel the effort and hardwork that has gone into producing one of these issues, with dozens of freshly taken photos and once-in-a-lifetime interviews. We aspire to reach that level of sincerity and artistry with the current “zine” format.

Considering one of our articles on this issue, it is fitting to offer a quote from longtime host of Cosmos Carl Sagan: “Books are proof that humans are capable of working magic.” I believe the same can apply to newspapers!

If you’d like to take a look through our history yourself, the resources are there for you.

“All of the past newspapers are online now, I would highly recommend that anyone who is interested in learning more about Aquinas history to check them out.,” Wendt said. “There are so many great stories and pictures out there that no one has seen or heard.”

Our first month of publications this semester has ended. Please, take note of history as we continue to write it.