55 years at Gazette:

COLFAX - In June 1965, newly-hired reporter Jerry Jones went to cover his first City Council meeting.

"Here we go again," he would think every June thereafter when he would sit down to cover yet another meeting.

Jones won't be thinking that this year as health issues have forced him to retire after 55 years covering the news, sports and crime in Colfax and Whitman County.

After graduating from Central Valley High School in 1960 in the present day city of Spokane Valley, Jones deferred being drafted by going to college at the University of Washington. He graduated from UW in 1964 and went with...