Letter from the publisher: A historic storm delays delivery

Tuesday night and into the day on Wednesday, the Daily Herald was challenged by nature’s fury — one of the most significant snowfall events in history, accompanied by blizzard conditions. Nature won out, if only for a short time.

We were unable to deliver your Wednesday Daily Herald during its normal early morning schedule, and instead you are receiving both Wednesday’s and Thursday’s newspapers today.

While we were unsuccessful in delivery yesterday because of the storm, I am proud of our staff’s commitment to you. The effort was valiant.

Creating a newspaper requires the work of an array of special people — reporters, photographers, columnists, editors, production staff, process and delivery drivers, and a network of carriers to deliver the newspaper to the driveway or the porch of subscribers every day. They were all hard at work Wednesday morning.

As the snowstorm pounded the suburbs, wave after wave, the editorial and process staffs worked into the night, in effect trapped in the offices in Arlington Heights and elsewhere. The production team, scheduled to report to the Paddock Printing Center in Schaumburg, found themselves in the eye of the blizzard. But they came to work, made ready the presses and completed the printing cycle. An army of newspaper drivers and delivery men and women was on duty to accept the newspapers in warehouses throughout the area. From these locations, hundreds of carriers were to embark on their routes. They never received the newspapers. Delivery drivers could not make it through.

Here is what the delivery drivers experienced:

The first delivery trucks headed for Lake County before midnight. One truck maneuvered around abandoned cars only to become stranded along the roadway. A second truck got as far as Route 53 and Euclid Avenue. The road was closed. This one also became stuck in a snowbank. We dispatched 4-wheel-drive vehicles to pick up the drivers. They were safe, but at that point, we knew delivering the papers would be impossible. At 3 a.m., we suspended the delivery. It was apparent that, despite our best efforts, we couldn’t make it.

Drivers and production staff spent the night at the print center and as the storm ended, they were back on the job Wednesday night to print and deliver the Daily Herald.

So this morning you are receiving two newspapers. On their pages, you will find content about this historic snow event and much more.

We are sorry for your inconvenience. We thank you for your understanding.