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| The Kramer Paper's First Issue, written by 8-year-old me in October, 2000 |
What is "The Kramer Paper"? Why pick such a laughably uncreative name for a blog? Well, there's a story behind that.
The “Kramer Paper” name dates back to 2000. When I was a boy, I drew up a quick one page “newspaper” for us to read on a plane ride to Tennessee. (see image) Over the next few years, the Kramer Paper grew and changed. For a while, I ran the Paper as our family’s official newsletter, and mailed it to relatives across the country. Over the years I lost interest, and with a (thankfully unpublished) passive-aggressive editorial, I mothballed the Paper indefinitely.
In 2013, while away at college, I decided to revive the Kramer Paper through a blog serving as an online edition, along with a restored print newsletter. As I grew and experienced more, the writing style changed, and articles grew longer. I briefly considered retiring the print publication entirely, but found that much of what I enjoy about this hobby is running and formatting the Pages document, something a blog can not do. Ironically, it was the blog component, not the print newsletter, that ended up nearly sidelined, as the Kramer Paper continued to grow.
The newer content, while more enjoyable to write and read, was longer and more detailed, resulting in longer newsletters and more expensive postage. After a few discussions, I decided that the Paper had, at least partially, outgrown the print publication. In response to this, I re-launched this blog, with a bit of a re-design inspired by another blog I have been following. Nevertheless, the Kramer Paper still exists, and continues to operate, publishing the best of the content I put on this blog. I could come up with a better name, but 20+ years of heritage under the Kramer Paper name seemed too much to toss out now.
In addition to its real history, the Kramer Paper has an entire semi-fictional corporate history as well, (based on what was going on with it at the time) depicting it as if it were an actual media corporation. The history came complete with mergers, and even a transportation subsidiary called Mail-link. (Mail-Link was the name for the bike route I used to drop the envelopes off at the post office, and I made little placards for my bicycle).
Later, while looking back on this, I compiled these artifacts into a sort of museum, and made a few new ones as well to keep the story going. I made business cards with a fictional address, corresponding to a building on a model train layout that bears the Paper's logo. I created "delivered by bicycle" inserts, and seals for envelopes. I even printed out new Mail-Link placards to put on my bicycle while running Kramer Paper-related errands. The MailLink name is still in use today. The Three Creeks Press mentioned at the top is part of this fictional history.
If you like, you can email me here:
Happy Reading
Steven Kramer
Chief Editor
The Kramer Paper
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