PALESTINE — Ward Cleaver sat in his easy chair reading one. The dad in Christmas Story sitting at the kitchen table was immersed in one. Norman Rockwell painted the iconic American father absorbed in one. The Sunday morning newspaper.

Television shows, movies and paintings mirror the American lifestyle which, for generations, has made the Sunday newspaper a part of its Sunday morning routine. The Sunday newspaper is, indeed, an American tradition. But, this American tradition, despite it pre-eminent  and omnipresent role in our lives for generations, is changing.

Sadly, today’s edition is the last Sunday edition of the Palestine Herald-Press.  Society and the manner in which Americans receive their news have changed and will continue to change. Part of that change involves the transformation of the traditional Palestine Herald-Press Sunday morning edition to a “Weekend Edition” published on Saturday and delivered to your mail box by the postal service.

The content of the Weekend Edition will be the same as the Sunday edition with a few pleasant additions. None of the traditional Sunday newspaper content has been removed.

Change is inevitable.  During my time in newspapers, 33-plus years, I have seen more changes than this Sunday edition has space to print. I had the privilege of helping develop a Saturday morning edition at the Daily Sun in Corsicana in 1984. We called the edition “The Saturday Morning Sun,” and the concept was successful until 2009. Not a bad run.

Also, during my year in Corsicana I was involved in the creation of a weekly shopper  distributed in three counties to 27,000 households. A successful vestige of that original product and concept is published out of the Daily Sun today.

In the early 90s we created the Corsicana Daily Sun web site, the company’s first venture into publishing on the world wide web. I’m sure the Palestine Herald-Press entered the digital age with web based dissemination of news about the same time.

Not long ago all newspapers owned by our newspaper company, Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc., began publishing E-Editions of their daily newspaper, simply complete copies of the daily newspaper available on the newspaper’s web site, but behind a pay wall, in other words, available only with payment for an E-Subscription.

Thus, the Palestine Herald Press can be read in its entirety — all stories, features, advertisements, tv guide, crossword, classified ads — all pages in sequence, a literal reproduction of the printed pages, from anywhere in the world to anyone with a computer, iPhone, smart phone, tablet or hand held device. I doubt Ben Franklin envisioned a digital newspaper as he operated his single sheet newspaper press.

Other recent changes included a change in our publication schedule.  In June 2009, you most likely recall we moved from a seven-day publication cycle to a five-day plan dissolving our Saturday and Monday editions. With the elimination of the Saturday paper, local high school football coverage went online to our web.

Last year we plunged into the world of magazines, publishing a premiere edition exactly one year ago this month, a local feature magazine we named Anderson County Nfocus. This full color, gloss finish magazine is a far cry from the daily newspaper and, of course, it is supposed to be. It chronicles the lives of vibrant members of our community and, moreover, it chronicles yet another change in how local newspapers disseminate information to their readers. An E-Edition of NFocus is even available on the Palestine Herald Press web site.

It is safe to say most newspapers our size and larger are now publishing a high quality magazine at least quarterly.

We are excited about another publication we have developed. Beginning Saturday, September 1, we will publish a weekly newspaper devoted exclusively to area high school football coverage delivered with your Saturday mail. This product will provide you with scores, stories, photos and statistics from the previous night’s local gridiron action.

Sunday mornings without a Sunday edition of the Palestine Herald-Press will not be the same. But then, in hindsight we adjusted to all the previous changes and we will adjust to this change.

In fact, some faithful newspaper readers never pick up a copy of the Palestine Herald-Press, rather, they read us online. Still others follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Our combined audience, print readers and online readers, surpasses 63,000 unique readers each month. A significant audience even by today’s standards, a result of the changes in society and the newspaper industry.

Considering the newspaper industry’s myriad changes,  I suppose the greatest is access — the ability of someone to read the Palestine Herald-Press anywhere, anytime whether they live in Palestine or Pamplona,  whether they are on their front porch in Neches or serving their country in Iraq.

Access. Day or night, the Palestine Herald Press is available. Call it the internet, the world wide web, the digital age or cyberspace, you can read your hometown newspaper wherever you are, whenever you are ready. And, that change is good for everyone.