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ALTON – His first assignment was covering a Southwestern school board meeting, and he wrote that story on a manual typewriter.
On Dec. 30, longtime Telegraph court reporter Sanford Schmidt cleaned out his desk, retiring after a 47-year career that spanned several generations of evolution in the newspaper business.
He noted that the past year in particular has seen a lot of change.
“It’s good that I’m getting out,” he said. “It’s been an odd year, and at 75, it’s too old to be doing this.”
From the technology to the philosophy of news coverage, he said everything has changed.
“We had mechanical typewriters. Somebody would cut newsprint into 8-by-11 sheets, and we’d use carbons (carbon paper),” he said. “When we got electric typewriters we thought we were really high-tech.”
It was also a lot noisier, with a lot of yelling and shouting as well as teletype machines “that were always pounding away,” he said.
Newspaper reporters had a reputation as “rough-and-tumble guys,” Schmidt said.
“Everybody smoked, including me,” he said. “It was a noxious atmosphere.”
Reporters were also known for their drinking. Schmidt said one of his bosses told him he finally quit “when he woke up one morning and his car was about that far (he gestured 6 inches) from a cliff.”
The newsroom was not the only place where there were great changes.
When Schmidt started there were several dozen workers in the “back shop” where a Linotype machine used molten lead to create type for the printing presses. That was eventually replaced with phototypesetting and computer typesetting, where the phrase “cut-and-paste” came from.
Today, the work of a dozen composing room workers – as well as several editors – can be done by a single editor using a computer from anywhere with an internet connection.
There has also been a great deal of change in newsroom philosophy, Schmidt said.
When he started, the paper had dozens of reporters in multiple bureaus with a major emphasis on government reporting. They would spend most of their nights at meetings and the mornings calling or going to local police departments for crime news, he said.
“We covered damn near everything,” he said. “There wasn’t anything too trivial to cover.”
“[Former editor and publisher] Steve Cousley considered it his duty,” he said. “They considered it their responsibility to do it.”
Schmidt worked part-time for The Telegraph before joining the staff full-time in June 1973. After graduating from Alton High School in 1964, he went to the University of Pennsylvania and majored in business.
“I had no business going to an Ivy League school majoring in business,” he said. “A lot of guys were just hanging around avoiding the draft, including me. After a while I got tired of hanging around so I finally dropped out and joined [the U.S. Army].
“If you joined, you get your choice of training,” he said. “If you got training in a field that didn’t involve shooting people, or people shooting at you, you had a better chance of survival. By then the war was very unpopular, and nobody wanted to die in Vietnam.”
He eventually ended up in Vietnam, working in logistics.
“It didn’t take a lot of courage where I was,” he said. “The place was full of generals and doctors.”
After Vietnam he and his wife, Barbara, moved to Fort Hood, Texas, and he worked at an Army desk job until he got out of the service. He went to Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville, where Schmidt said he did well in everything except photography.
“I was good at the academics, but I was a terrible shooter,” he said, adding he would occasionally have to take photographs for the newspaper.
“Every time the photographers got film from me, they’d roll their eyes,” he said. “After a while they told me not to take any more photos.”
At The Telegraph, Schmidt worked in several different bureaus, and also as an assistant city editor and city editor, before landing on the court beat about a decade ago.
He said it suited him.
“Civil cases can get boring,” he said. “Until the courthouse closed [because of COVID-19] we covered the initial filings, but we seldom covered trials because they took so long.”
It was also difficult because most cases were settled out of court with no details being made public, he said.
“I spend my time in criminal, because there are more stories and it’s much more interesting,” Schmidt said.
Schmidt said a former literature teacher said something that influenced his preferences.
“He said, ‘Throughout history, evil has been considered interesting, and virtue is considered boring,’” Schmidt said. “That stuck in my mind.”
The other element to good stories is conflict, he said. He said one of his bosses, Elmer Broz, wanted “a good lead, something with conflict and a hook in it.”
“People criticize us for trying to attract attention,” Schmidt said. “But if we didn’t, nobody would read it and we’d have been out of business a long time ago.”
Schmidt said one of the most important lessons he learned is to ask questions, something that is often hard for young reporters.
“You’d have holes in the story because you didn’t ask any questions,” he said. “I always asked questions after every meeting. You just wanted to establish that habit, and sometimes you’d ask a question that led to more questions. I think that’s difficult for everybody. Middle-class kids are not raised to ask questions of people who are older, and that’s one of the things you have to do.”
With his desk cleaned out, he plans to spend time with his family: his wife, two daughters and their grandchildren.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: February 12, 2026 Media Contact Information: Bob Hubberts (847) 508-4995 bhubberts@firstillinoisrobotics.org
Chicago, Illinois – Creativity and science will come together this Saturday at the FIRST® LEGO® League Challenge Illinois State Championship at Elgin Community College, 1700 Spartan Drive, Elgin, Illinois, where 56 teams of 9- to 14-year-old students and coaches will demonstrate their problem-solving skills, creative thinking, teamwork, competitive play, sportsmanship, and sense of community. The tournament is open to the public. The robot table competition portion of the event starts at Noon on Saturday, February 14th. More than 650,000 students in over 75 countries will participate in the FIRST® UNEARTHED season. Teams will have to program robots, using LEGO Education technology, to solve a set of missions on an obstacle course set on a thematic playing surface. For the UNEARTHED challenge students will unearth hidden treasures and piece together the past as they embark on this thrilling journey of discovery. Students will identify and research a problem related to the season theme and then design and create a possible solution. They will also identify a mission strategy and design, create, and code a robot to complete missions during a 2.5-minute Robot Game. The competition is judged in three areas: innovation project; robot design, and core values, which embody aspects of teamwork and good sportsmanship. Top robot game scores are also honored. FIRST LEGO League is an international program for 9- to 14-year-olds (ages vary by country) created in a partnership between FIRST and the LEGO Group in 1998 to get students excited about science and technology – and teach them valuable career and life skills. Using LEGO® Education technologies and materials, students work alongside adult mentors to design, build, and program autonomous robots and create an innovative solution to a problem as part of their research project. After several intense weeks, the competition season culminates at high-energy, sports-like tournaments. Like any other organized “sport,” teams also fundraise, create a team identity, and go on field trips. The tournament is being run by FIRST Illinois Robotics, a 501 c3 organization focused on delivering FIRST programs in Illinois. Contact us for a list of the area schools and youth organizations with teams participating in the competition. About FIRST® FIRST® is a robotics community that prepares young people for the future through a suite of inclusive, team-based robotics programs for ages 4-18 (PreK-12) that can be facilitated in school, in structured after-school programs or by other organizations or groups of parents. Boosted by a global support system of volunteers, educators, and sponsors that include over 200 of the Fortune 500 companies, teams operate under a signature set of FIRST Core Values to conduct research, fundraise, design, build, and showcase their achievements during annual challenges. An international not-for-profit organization founded in 1989, FIRST has a proven impact on STEM learning, interest, and skill-building well beyond high school. Participants and alumni of FIRST programs gain access to education and career discovery opportunities, connections to exclusive scholarships and employers, and a place in the FIRST community for life. Learn more at firstinspires.org.
### To learn more about FIRST programs in Illinois, go to www.firstillinoisrobotics.org.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 7, 2026 Media Contact Information: Christopher Weishaar Digital Public relations Specialist (515) 273-7140 cweishaar@studentloan.org
WEST DES MOINES, IOWA (January 7, 2026) — Six high school seniors will each earn a scholarship valued at $1,500 through the 2026 ISL Midwest Senior Scholarship program. This program is sponsored by ISL Education Lending and is designed to make higher education more accessible while equipping students with essential financial literacy skills. Who Can Apply? All high school seniors attending school in Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, South Dakota and Wisconsin are eligible to enter. No essay is required—making it simple and stress-free to apply. Parents Can Register Their Student Parents now have the option to register their student for the scholarship program, ensuring every eligible senior has the opportunity to participate. What Makes This Program Unique? Every participant will learn valuable financial literacy tips during the process, helping them prepare for life after high school. How to Apply Applications open on January 5, 2026, and close on April 30, 2026. Students and parents can apply online at www.iowastudentloan.org/Midwest. Winners will be announced in June 2026. Scholarship Details
Why It Matters “Student loan debt is a huge concern for new college students,” said Steve McCullough, president and CEO of ISL Education Lending. “As a nonprofit, we provide tools and resources to help high school seniors plan so they can reduce the amount of debt they need to take on while achieving their education goals. Students sign up for a chance at a $1,500 scholarship, and we take that opportunity to share information with them about our free resources.” Additional Resources Available In addition to offering student loans, ISL Education Lending has other resources for families planning for college and for students who intend to pursue advanced degrees. The Parent Handbook consists of valuable tips to help families of students in sixth through 12th grades prepare for success in college and other postsecondary options. Parents of students in eighth through 12th grades can also sign up to receive twice-monthly emailed tips on academic, college and career planning through the Student Planning Pointers for Parents program. The College Funding Forecaster helps families understand the total cost of four years of college based on a freshman-year financial aid offer. Information about these resources is available at www.IowaStudentLoan.org/SmartBorrowing.
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About ISL Education Lending Established in 1979 as Iowa Student Loan Liquidity Corporation, a private, nonprofit organization, ISL Education Lending helps students and families obtain the resources necessary to succeed in postsecondary education. ISL has helped nearly 400,000 students pay for college, offering student loans and other products under the name ISL Education Lending. The organization, based in West Des Moines, Iowa, also provides an array of borrower benefits, financial literacy tools and community reinvestment programs, including support for free college planning services for students and their families. For more information, visit www.IowaStudentLoan.org.
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