Certain people on life’s journey inspire us along our career path and show us that following your true calling brings more happiness than climbing the corporate ladder. Often, we don’t let these people know the impact they had or how much we appreciated them until it is too late.
I just hope that local journalist Herman Wrede knew how much I appreciated him – as much for his corny humor and savant-like ability to recall people’s birthdays as for his love of writing.
When my mom called me to say that Herman had recently passed away, it saddened me but also brought to mind the smiles that Herman spread around the city and county throughout his many years here.
My first encounter with him was during high school, when he corrected papers for my Senior English teacher. When I was a fledgling reporter at the Free Lance, Herman was a columnist who had a seemingly unending supply of corny jokes he’d unabashedly deliver in the newsroom whether they garnered a laugh or not.
My colleagues and I would joke that if we forgot to bring a lunch that day we could just follow Herman around, because he had an amazing ability to find food at a local office potluck.
Sure enough, if the Free Lance had so much as a plate of cookies out, Herman would show up. Always the proper gentleman, he would say something like, “Would you mind if I partook in one of these fine confections?” knowing that we couldn’t say no to him.
Herman’s columns in the Free Lance and Pinnacle weren’t always about topics of the day – often they were a history lesson or a Paul Harvey-like essay with a moral underpinning. They were a slice of San Benito County life that not so much detailed everyday events as they detailed the wonderful social fabric that is woven throughout our area.
Herman looked the part of a journalist, a bit disheveled in simple button-down short-sleeved shirt and slacks. And it was his amazing connections with so many local people that made him an icon.
In the foreword to his book, “Day by Day, 1995,” in which Herman walks the reader through the daily goings-on in our county as if we were reading his diary, he reminds us that “There is no other place quite like San Benito County.”
“All who moved away always remember the little pleasures they assumed might be found anywhere,” he wrote. “The gradual lighting of the eastern sky just before dawn bursts in silent splendor, the sparkling freshness of the air, the hint of a sea breeze that wafts in from Moss Landing through a notch in the mountains, the unending blue summer sky with a few clouds pasturing in it, the slanted rain that sweeps through orchards and streets, and the long fields of home, green, gold, and rich with promise.”
Herman was a small-town journalist, but he could turn a phrase with the best of them. For that, we are lucky to have had him as a chronicler of our times.
Those who recall their time in our county, he continued in his book, “remember the people, always the people, who played supporting parts in the story of their early life.”
Herman, for me, was part of the story of my life and the lives of many others. We may not have told him how much we appreciated him, but when we offered him a plate at our potluck or laughed at his jokes, we can only hope that he knew.
Adam Breen teaches journalism and yearbook at San Benito High School. He is former editor of The Free Lance.
