Late in the evening on Dec. 6, 1977, I walked up a flight of stairs and into the StarPhoenix newsroom.

It had been quite a day. It was my first day.

I skipped the StarPhoenix team in a media curling event. Larry Tucker, then the sports columnist at the paper, said if we didn’t win, I would be fired before I officially started.

As I recall, I had to draw the eight- foot for the victory. I got to keep my job.

That night, I covered a Super Curling League game. I had curled in the league for three or four years, but now I was on the other side of the glass.

Games should be easy to cover. “Rick Folk scored three on the first end and so-and-so was never able to recover.” Throw in a tad of play- by-play, some quotes, the scores of other games, and send the story to an editor.

Nope, it was just my luck that a game got heated. I had never seen that in curling. A fight almost broke out. My memory isn’t great, but I don’t think the game was completed. I had to interview guys I had curled with and against.

Tucker was with me and said something like, “You’ve got this, Mate.”

Mate didn’t have this, but pounded away on an electric typewriter until there was a story for the next day’s paper.

These are some memories that came back to me before and after recent tour of the newsroom, where I spent 33 years of my life. There are many more.

The building is empty now. The press has stopped running. It was always a thrill to see and hear it churning out the next day’s edition.

Now, where there were once approximately 300 people working, there is no one. Those few that are left will work from their homes.

There was once a decades-long wait for a parking spot, and Christmas party tickets sold faster than those when there is a $70 million lottery prize.

When I started, the newsroom had more than 70 people. The industry standard was one for every 1,000 of circulation.

The number of staff got fewer and fewer as new owners put profit far ahead of journalism. I get that it’s a business, but papers were rolling in dough in those days. Each new owner took the paper farther from family ownership to a cold, dark place.

We were so lucky to work for the Sifton family, who had owned the paper since 1928, and sold it in 1996.

Those in the newsroom, and throughout the building, worked hard on behalf of the paper’s readers, but a lot of the heart and soul was cut out on March 1996, when Conrad Black’s henchman, a fellow named David Radler, chopped the careers out from under 70-some employees, including 25 in the newsroom.

Radler had these strange eyes, which wandered all over the place, but never directly at the person with whom he was speaking. Maybe he didn’t want to see the person he was about to execute.

Both Radler and Black would eventually be sent to prison in the United States. Radler got his term for fraud and Black for his role in the misappropriation of millions of dollars from his newspaper empire.

When I left, a company named Postmedia owned the paper. It would be more correct to say a New Jersey hedge fund was in charge. It kept the chain afloat, while Postmedia sold assets like the StarPhoenix building to keep making payments on its debt.

People are the biggest assets, of course, and papers have chopped staffs to the proverbial bone. There are now 13 people in the editorial department at the StarPhoenix.

As an aside, when I think of a hedge fund, I think of a loan shark.

Postmedia purchased the chain at a time when classified ads were going to places like Kijiji and advertisers were going online. The large package of flyers that comes to your door weekly has slowly eroded. And circulation was plummeting.

I started in the sports department, moved to night editor, city editor and managing editor. Of those positions, I was only comfortable in sports and on the news desk.

I wasn’t a good city editor, and never felt comfortable as the managing editor. I left the paper to take a job with the Saskatoon Express, which closed in 2019. A handful of people from the Express work for this paper on a part-time basis.

For last few years, I have wanted to see the inside of the SP building one more time. In May 2011, I left quickly and somewhat quietly. Many people thought I had been fired, but I wasn’t. Had I stayed, I would have been fired and sent away with a severance package. The Express job was now or never, and I chose now.

The sports department was the most fun, although the night news desk was close behind. Yes, we managed to have fun, while doing our jobs well.

In sports, we played hockey, softball and slow pitch together. The guys helped with the landscaping when Sandy and I bought our first home. One of them hung wallpaper for us.

We played pranks on each other.

In the summer, we could have a young worker join us. One summer, the kid was arrogant, so we created a sports league. The night news editor would phone in scores every night and the rookie would take them down and type them up for the stats page.

It was worse than that even. The night news editor would botch the scores. He would have partial scores, like Prince Albert 4, but not know what the other team had. The young fella would get off the phone cursing.

We never fessed up. One night the news editor phoned and thanked the summer worker for his great coverage and said the league was folding.

I was the victim of the meanest gag. I had been dispatched to Brandon for the Canada Winter Games. When I returned, I had to do an expense account. Tucker said he would help.

I looked it over and saw he had included a laundry charge. He said when you go away for a week, it is expected. I turned in the expense account.

The next night there was a note from the man who hired me to be to discuss my expenses. I thought I would be fired over $8 worth of laundry.

When I got to the office, a couple of guys in on the caper were roaring with laughter. I remember being so relieved.

I chuckled when I thought about our resistance to taking computer training. “It will never last,” we said. Little did we know, or almost anyone else, that the little box with a dark background and green type would send papers to the brink of death.

During my visit, I walked over to the office that was once mine.

Strangely, it was intact. It had the same desk and chairs and filing cabinet. I was happy to see it that way. When I sat in my old chair, it felt like home.

My greatest memory will be of the journalists who did outstanding work on a daily basis. They took on some big projects and excelled. They were the eyes of community, recording its history a story at a time. It wouldn’t be right not to mention the incredible support staff.

We celebrated the city’s successes, and reported on its warts. Despite the perception, there is more good news than bad in a newspaper.

I made friends, too many to name for fear I will forget to include someone. Those who have passed will forever be in my memory. Those I saw during the tour helped bring back memories of the great times we had, and the great work that was done.

I am grateful for the privilege of working at the StarPhoenix. I am grateful that I got to sit at my desk one last time.

• Cam Hutchinson