This monthâs lecture at Gualala Arts Center will feature Rob Elder and Stephan McLaughlin discussing their contrasting careers÷Rob Elder's as retired editor of the San Jose Mercury News, and Steve McLaughlin's as editor for the Independent Coast Observer. Questions from the audience will be encouraged. Admission is a $5 donation.

Steve McLaughlin lives in Gualala and is owner and editor of the Independent Coast Observer. He was born in San Jose, grew up in Palo Alto and attended the University of Santa Clara until 1971, when he began to work full-time at the ICO, which was started by his parents two years before. He has been involved in all aspects of the paper ever since, as everyone in town can attest, having seen him racing around with his camera or delivering papers to the stores. The ICO is an absolute necessity in every household on this part of the coast. With a circulation of around 3,000 it is certainly read by many more.

As the proud owner and editor of an excellent small town newspaper, Steve is in a good position to compare and contrast his experience with that of an editor of a cosmopolitan newspaper, such as Rob Elder.

A California resident since 1976, Rob Elder is currently senior follow for The Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University.

Elder was a reporter for television stations in Washington, D.C., later covering Nashville, civil rights in the in the 1960âs for The Nashville Tennessean. He did feature writing and investigative reporting for The Miami Herald, spent a year with a journalism education project in Atlanta, and joined the staff of The Mercury News in 1977, becoming editorial page editor in 1978, and managing editor in 1983. He retired on September 10, 2001.

During his career as a journalist he traveled widely in Central and South America, Europe, and Asia. He has walked across the city of Havana, ridden the Red Arrow Express from Helsinki to Moscow, and stayed at Chinaâs Great Wall Holiday Inn. As a civil rights reporter in Mississippi in 1964, he eluded the Klan by hiding under a feather bed in a sharecropper cabin. As editor of the Mercury News in 1994, he attended a state dinner at the White House.

Since 2001 Elder has lived on the northern California coast at The Sea Ranch with his cat named William of Orange. You can guess what color the cat is.