That tradition is long gone, of course, along with a lot of other newspaper eccentricities. I remember my personal tipping point. It was watching our night police reporter – green, but talented and eager enough – kick off her shoes, turn on the newsroom television and start munching on a salad for dinner. Not for her drinking her meal at the press club or the local restaurant hang-out.

     Well, sic transit and all that. I'd watched the composing room disappear in the face of computerization, and a database library had reduced the morgue to little more than a place to find historic photos. Clattering Telex and Teletype machines were replaced by online news services, and Charlie, the almost totally deaf (he had to be) keeper of the machines, was put out to pasture. Calls that started “Hello, Sweetheart, get me Rewrite” became an e-filed story directed at the city desk terminals from wherever the reporter happened to be.

     But I think the one thing I missed the most, those final years, was Christmas in the Darkroom.

     Every holiday season, right around now, the photo department turned on the lights. Everyone brought food and drink, and everyone was expected to turn up. Everyone, that is, from the newsroom. No one officially declared it off-limits to other departments, but … you know … it just seemed to work out that way. I don't think they wanted to hang out with us anyway – did I mention we were disreputable?

     It had gone on for decades, some years more elaborate than others. I don't know when it started, but the veteran photogs – Gladys, Cec, Stan, Walter, Mike – told me it was a long time before. Perhaps it dated to when they came back from the war and took up their civilian careers. Maybe it was even earlier. I never really knew, and it didn't really matter.

     What did matter is that whatever beefs we had – against the outside world, against management, against each other – were buried in camaraderie for one afternoon. So what if the food seemed to be contaminated with the always-present stench of chemicals: A good belt of Canadian Club would clear the palate. None of us was particularly worried about getting cancer or some other ailment – we just wanted to party for awhile.

     It never turned into a bacchanalia – although more than one of us prayed there wouldn't be a call-out to someplace where the cops might be expected – but it was always a good time.

     The annual affair was eventually killed by a newly appointed editor who didn't share our tastes or our proclivities – or our idea of what “newsroom family” was. Ca va.

     Probably, it was inevitable. I mean, there aren't even darkrooms anymore. That tradition and skill are also gone in the face of digital photography and Photoshop experts. The job became all about business – ruthless efficiency, reduced staff levels, eroded caring, continual retrenching, focus groups. It got far too serious, white collar and drab.

     I think, sometimes, that's really what's at the heart of declining newspapers: No one is having disreputable fun any more.

     And it shows.