Greg Lee: Working in the ‘toy department’ has been nothing short of fabulous

It was late August 1984, and I drove into Coeur d’Alene needing to find a place to live.

(The last time I had been through CdA was when I was going into seventh grade and my family moved back to the Tri-Cities after spending five years chasing jobs at nuclear power plants in the Midwest. It was the summer of ’74 and that little thing called Expo ’74 was taking place in Spokane.)

Just a couple of days earlier, I had accepted an offer to be a high school sports writer at The Spokesman-Review. It was a newly created position based out of CdA, covering North Idaho schools.

At the time, I was living in Portland and in the middle of a second internship at The Oregonian newspaper.

William Hilliard, then The Oregonian’s executive editor, had invited me after my junior year at Eastern Washington University to serve an internship at his newspaper. I was the first EWU journalism student to do so at the prestigious newspaper.

Toward the end of that summer, Mr. Hilliard asked me if I wanted to come back after I graduated the following spring. I couldn’t say yes fast enough.

It was nearing mid-August of my second internship and I didn’t have any serious prospects on the full-time job front. Mr. Hilliard told me he’d extend my internship until I found a job. What an incredible man.

About a week later, S-R sports editor Jeff Jordan called. I’d covered a game or two for him while I was at EWU.

It was a Thursday. He asked if I was interested in a job. Again, I couldn’t say yes fast enough. He said he was going in to talk to his boss and call me the next day.

Jeff called and asked if I could be in Spokane the following Tuesday to go through orientation and to fill out the application for the job for which I was hired.

So there I was, driving around in my Ford Bronco II on that late August day in 1984, with no idea what to do for a place to live.

I can’t help but smile as I recall that day. I found an apartment near 15th and Elm. I’m not going to specifically say where the apartment was located because I still live in CdA. But suffice to say when I discovered four slugs crawling around on the shower floor the first morning, I knew I needed to look elsewhere.

The first 25 years of my 32-plus years at The S-R, I covered mostly Idaho prep sports, including an 18-month stint as a cops/court reporter. When the newspaper ended the Idaho edition, I started crossing over and helping with Spokane-area preps.

The last six years I’ve been the lone full-time prep writer. At one time, we had five full-time prep writers sharing the load and an assistant editor in charge of prep-related administrative duties.

Former sports editor Joe Palmquist has teased me over the years about writing too long (and, yes, this is too long). To his credit, though, he was patient and never made it an ultimatum to write shorter. He was such a good person to work for.

And I can’t thank Jordan enough. He took a chance on a 23-year-old kid green in the armpits. He probably should have fired me not long after hiring me.

I covered a West Valley/East Valley football game soon after arriving. I committed a cardinal sin. I mixed up the team’s mascots in my story. Hazard the thought of me calling Jeff’s beloved EV (he’s an EV graduate) the Eagles instead of the Knights.

When I reached the six-month probation evaluation period, it was suggested by another editor that I should be let go. But Jordan convinced his boss otherwise.

I should have never had an internship at The Oregonian, let alone two with an open door to keep working there until I landed a full-time gig.

Then the position at the S-R opened. I wasn’t qualified for it, to be honest. I hadn’t paid dues like many of my colleagues. I say all this because, as a person of faith, I believe there was some divine intervention. How else do you explain the favor that launched my career?

I arrived in CdA single. My wife and I celebrated 31 years of marriage in August. And I have three fabulous adult children. What more can a husband/father ask for?

What’s next? Only God knows.

I can’t walk out the door without emphasizing I’ve had the time of my life. So many memories, including the time I watched CdA basketball standout Kyle Wombolt score 55 points in a road game at Lewiston and Austin Rehkow of Central Valley kick a 67-yard field goal. I got to cover one of the all-time great female athletes from this region, CdA’s Corissa Yasen, a track and basketball standout who went on to do both sports at Purdue. There was wrestler Jared Lawrence of Sandpoint, who went undefeated. And I had the pleasure of chronicling the wrestling career of Lakeside’s Dalton Young, who also never lost a match.

I covered the 1993-94 CdA girls basketball team, coached by a wonderful man, Dave Fealko, go 25-0 and win a state title in the final year that the city was a one-school town.

Fealko moved over to Lake City when it opened the following year and he coached the Timberwolves, with a handful of girls from the year before at CdA, to a state title.

I watched so many more outstanding feats and countless teams win state titles – some anticipated and others out of nowhere.

I got to tell so many wonderful stories. One of my favorites was in the winter of 2016 when I met Rodrick Fisher, formerly known as Rodrick Jackson. I’ve had a front-row seat in the turnaround story of the EV standout athlete.

I got paid to work in the toy department. Not my line, but one I heard many years ago. The good times far exceed any bad days.

Down the road I hope to work for the newspaper again in a part-time capacity.

So, until then, thanks for all the fun.