Home »
Ride/write on brother
e-KNOW Editorial
By Ian Cobb
I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone quite as interesting as David F. Rooney.
A South American raised Canadian; a talented artist, writer, photographer and a pioneering journalist, Dave’s life passage contained deep layers.
He was a classic example of how when you meet someone you never really know who or what they are; we are all secret bastions to one degree or another.
Simply put, Dave did not live a normal life. A journalist’s life never is ‘normal’ but Dave constantly left me dazed and amazed whenever we spent time nursing a few cold ones at annual newspaper conferences.
He and I were the ‘old guys’ as the new century began; the greybeards who carried the standards of our mentors and tutors, or so we liked to believe.
As the corporatization of newspapers continued, Dave escaped the game and got away from the dithering nitwit bean counter fools who continue to erode the foundations of journalism and in the town he had grown to deeply love, Revelstoke, he began one of the very first online only newspapers – the Revelstoke Current in 2009.
In 2010, Carrie and I bumped into Dave in Revelstoke. He had a familiar look about him; camera and note pad in hand. I knew he was out of the print game and asked what he was up to. In the next 10 minutes our lives would forever change. He told me about the Current – how he loved it because it was his (note nitwit comment above) and he could stay in Revelstoke.
That was the seed from which sprang e-KNOW. His idea and work, his Current, was the inspiration that fuelled the creation of e-KNOW.
In the year we molded the idea of e-KNOW I leaned on Dave numerous times for advice and, always amiable yet never one to suffer fools, he immediately shared a warning, as he’d had a few health scares after burning too long into the red. “My best advice to you is to not kill yourself; take a break. It’s not worth killing yourself for.”
I don’t think he really took his own advice; Dave was as committed to Revelstoke as any journalist can be to his or her community of service and he served his community extremely well.
I first met Dave in Banff when he was working as a stringer for the Crag & Canyon, and later became editor and helmed that paper during some strong years.
Later, he headed back to the big city and taught journalism and web design at the Centre for Communications Studies at Mount Royal College in Calgary from 1998 to 2000. He wrote a textbook – Reporting and Writing for Canadian Journalists – which I recommend to anyone considering journalism as a career.
Earlier in his career he worked for the Canadian Press and Ottawa Citizen in Ottawa and later had stints at the Calgary Herald and Edmonton Sun.
He was the quintessential editor; a bit rumpled, grizzled, seasoned, fearless and unfailingly fair to all.
They are traits that will serve him well on his latest adventure – the afterlife. Dave passed away at his home in Revelstoke on Friday, July 21.
He takes with him a lifetime of incredible memories and leaves behind some pretty great ones; such as staying up until the sun rose in Williams Lake during a newspaper conference and then attending a day of workshops – work hard play hard baby.
With that David, my friend, I bid you adios. Thanks for your friendship and mentorship and thanks for showing me a way forward at a time when I didn’t see one.
Ride/write on brother.
– Ian Cobb is owner/editor of e-KNOW
