Catching up with past employees who helped West Of make it 20 years … and counting
by Lorne Chambers | Editor
Looking back at two decades of publishing West Of, there are so many stories that stand out to me. Of course, there are the literal stories that we covered for the paper, some more memorable than others. Then, there are stories from things that happened at the office or outside the office with staff, some more regrettable than others. Many I can’t print. But above all, when I look back at the last 20 years, I think about all the people who made it happen or at least made it fun.
West Ashley’s community newspaper keeps rolling on, and, hopefully, keeps improving, much like West Ashley itself. For that, I have our current West Of crew to thank, like designer extraordinaire Shanna Thompson, who has been our chief ad builder since last year. Her talent and professionalism make our clients happy and make Lindsey and my jobs so much easier. My friend and former grad school classmate Elise Lusk is doing a great job covering the West Ashley arts scene, with an eye always locked on the local literature scene. Recently added to the West Of team is seasoned journalist Matt Proust, who began covering West Ashley news and happenings for the paper this month. See two of his stories in this edition.
There are also regular contributors like Donna Jacobs, who has written her fan-favorite West Ashley Flashback column for most of the duration of our 20-year run. There’s Joan Perry, whose West Ashley Wanderer column and photographs have become popular among readers in recent years. It should be noted that Joan is also a master crafter and created the amazing Coburg Cow newspaper cake on the paper’s cover this month.
Columnists from the past also played a role in the story of West Of. Whether it was Andy Brack’s political column Brack Talk or Katie Well’s entertaining Life Unscripted musings. Andy is now the co-owner and editor of The Charleston City Paper and Katie is the Vice President of Learning and Development at ASM Global and whose daughter is the coolest kid on the planet.
There’s also my dear friend Dr. Jeffrey Gredlein, who introduced me and many of our readers to good beer long before it was even cool. His longtime beer column, The Beer Snob, ran in the paper for over 15 years. Dr. G is a psychology professor at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts and lives in Greensboro, NC, with his lovely wife and two dogs.
For this special 20th Anniversary issue, I was able to catch up with nearly all the key employees from the last 20 years. These were the folks who were more than just periodic contributors or spent more than a few fleeting moments in West Of’s employ. These are the ones who carried the heavy loads, often during tough times and helped make us reach the 20-year mark.
There are two glaring omissions here. The first is former staff writer Charlie Morrison, who now works at Tennessee State University and lives in Nashville with his professional cellist wife. The other is former Art Director Brian Smith, who helped guide West Of through its transition from a weekly tabloid to a monthly news magazine, redesigning the entire paper and rebranding the company’s logo and marketing collateral. In addition to being one helluva designer and a great dog-sitter, Smith remains an elusive man of mystery. The last reports were that he was living somewhere along the Gulf of Mexico, raising turtles and tortoises.
While I regret these two omissions, it was not for lack of trying. Thankfully, the rest of the West Of family joined me on my jaunt down memory lane. Here is an update on what they’re doing now and some reminiscences about their time at West Of.
I feel extraordinarily lucky to have worked with so many talented and fun people over the years. I’m even more lucky to still be friends with all of them and get together regularly with many of them. I’ve been to their weddings, helped them get other jobs, helped them move, and watched their career and children grow.
Warren Cobb
Managing Editor, 2005-2012
When I began planning a community newspaper for West Ashley back in 2004, Warren Cobb was the first person I reached out to. Not only were we childhood friends, but we had worked together at a similar newspaper along the Gulf Coast of Florida after graduating from the College of Charleston.
As West Of’s first employee, Warren helped make West Of a go-to source for all things West Ashley. He served as the paper’s managing editor for seven years. After leaving West Of in 2012, Warren moved briefly into the world of marketing before enrolling in grad school at the University of South Carolina. He received his Master’s degree in Library and Information Science in 2020 and worked as an archivist in Washington DC for a year before moving back to the Lowcountry and taking a position as a Reference Librarian at the Beaufort County Library at Hilton Head. Last year, Warren became a Research and Instruction Librarian at USC-Beaufort, running the library at the school’s historic coastal campus.
“West Of remains one of my proudest accomplishments. My time at the publication was a living example of the idea that if you love what you do, you will never work a day in your life. What fun we had!” says Warren. “We were making it up as we went, so there were very few rules about what a newspaper (or newspaper office) had to be or look like. And while we didn’t take ourselves too seriously, we took the work very seriously. We were fun but also idealistic.”
According to Warren, community newspapers like West Of are important because they hold local officials accountable and give readers actionable information about the goings-on in the community.
“We set out to try to elevate the West Ashley community into its own thing, highlighting its own traditions, values, and ideals, and to introduce readers to ‘the people in your neighborhood.’ I think we did that,” says Warren. “And I think West Of has continued to crystalize the community for the past two decades.”
Bill Davis
News Editor, 2012-2023
Award-winning journalist Bill Davis and I first met in the early 2000s when we worked together and shared a small office at the Charleston City Paper. I covered the music scene, and Bill was on the news desk.
In early 2005, I struck out on his own, opening West Of, and Bil went on to cover the state legislature for 11 years for the S.C. State House Report. When there was an opening in the West Of newsroom, I reached out to my old friend and coworker. Bill was our paper’s news editor for the next decade, focusing on local politics, schools, and development issues that impacted West Ashley.
“One of the things I miss the most about working at West Of is knowing what is going on in the part of town where I live,” Bill says. “When you know what is actually going on, you see where West Ashley fits into the region’s future.”
After nearly 30 years as a journalist, Bill now works at the Social Security Administration, where he describes his role as a “down-market Oprah Winfrey,” helping the disabled, elderly, homeless, and poor apply for monthly governmental subsidies. If you know Bill personally, then you also know he’s also a well-established stand-up comedian in town, often hosting comedy nights at local clubs or performing around the Southeast.
So, why the move into the public sector after three decades of reporting? Ironically, the money, he says. “Apparently, being a writer in a state where so few can read, is a terrible business model,” Bill adds. “Good luck, West Of, on the next 20 years!”
Jenny Peterson
Staff Writer, 2023-2025
Jenny Peterson and I first met when she was still a student at the College of Charleston and had an internship at the Charleston City Paper, where I had just started working after getting fired from my crumby public relations job.
Now, Jenny has been a working journalist for 20 years, spending more than half that time in community newspapers. She started her career in 2004 at The Moultrie News, covering Daniel Island—a brand new community at the time—her first job/beat when she graduated from the CofC with a degree in media communication.
Jenny moved on to work for more hyperlocal community newspapers throughout Charleston communities, including serving as editor of both The James Island Journal and The Summerville Journal Scene. She moved back to her hometown of New Orleans in 2009 and served as editor of the St. Bernard News, a community newspaper in a suburb of the city.
Jenny knows firsthand the importance of community newspapers in informing and engaging with the local community, holding elected officials accountable, and following a news story from its inception in the public setting through a committee and to a final vote. She says she loves interviewing people to understand why an issue is important and always aims to write clearly and understandably.
“From the garden club to city council, everything is important,” she says.
Moving back to Charleston in 2009, Jenny worked for local TV station ABC News 4 as an evening content manager, helping make sure the 11 p.m. news had the latest breaking news for residents. Peterson then moved into magazine journalism as the editor of Charleston Living, telling stories of the people and places that make the Charleston area such a great place to live.
Jenny joined the West Of team as a staff writer in 2023 and enjoyed informing West Ashley residents about important topics, from development plans to the forthcoming planetarium. As of last month, she’s now a business reporter at the Post & Courier with a focus on retail. She continues to fulfill her high school newspaper class dreams as a full-time journalist and continues to subscribe to the mantra that everything is important.
Joe Felder
Staff Photographer, 2010-2013
In early 2010, West Of, like a lot of small businesses at the time, was still reeling from the Great Recession and trying to find its footing again. Enter Charleston native “Photo” Joe Felder, a young, friendly freelance photographer who strode into the West Of office one day and said that he wanted to shoot some photos for the paper. Even better, he was willing to do it for little-to-no pay.
Joe’s upbeat personality and infectious laugh were a much-needed shot in the arm for the West Of team. Suddenly, the little-newspaper-that-could had a real photographer on its staff. The photos that were printed in the paper during those years were well above the quality that a community rag should have. But alas, like all good things, the Photo Joe era came to an end when he married his long-time sweetheart Amy and, along with their dog Stark, headed west … much further west than West Ashley.
After leaving Charleston in 2013, Joe landed in San Francisco for a stint, freelancing for news and editorial outlets around the Bay Area. Eventually, the Felders moved to Colorado and Joe went back to college, receiving a degree in Mechanical Engineering from Colorado State.
“I now reside in Northern Colorado, where every winter, I find myself questioning my life choices,” Joe says, who’s now a research and development mechanical engineer at Advanced Energy. But he still takes his trusty camera everywhere he goes. He also looks back fondly on his days with West Of.
“Someone told me once, it might have been Warren, that the best thing about being in the news is we got to go to stuff for free and do things that other people don’t get to do,” he recalls. “And West Of was always involved in the best stuff, from running around town for days dressed as pirates for The Almanac or the Cookbook issues, which were always my favorite. Fortunately for me, those came twice a year. We were always in the mix of what was happening in West Ashley. Man, I think it might have been the best job I ever had.”
Kristin Hackler
Staff Writer, 2012-2014
Kristin Hackler, former journalist and editor, did not wander far from her writing roots. After leaving West Of in 2014, she spent some time ghostwriting for several national organizations as well as a civil plaintiffs attorney firm before landing at Advantage Media in downtown Charleston. At the time, Advantage was a small local book publisher focusing on nonfiction business books, but it soon grew to include the imprints of Forbes Books, Entrepreneur Books, and South By Southwest (SXSW) Books.
Kristin started with Advantage as their first in-house ghostwriter, then developed the role of Ghostwriting Manager before landing where she is today: Director of Book Architecture, where she works with a team guiding new authors in developing the creative direction of their book plan. It’s a role that constantly keeps her on her toes, and while it may get hectic, it is never boring.
“I definitely miss my days working with the West Of team,” said Kristin with a wistful smile. “I mean, you can’t beat a job where your day could include going to fun events, visiting new businesses, and meeting all kinds of amazing people, and then writing about the experience. I am so proud and grateful to have been a part of such a great team and an iconic West Ashley publication!”
Erick Pineda
Art Director, 2013-2016
Erick Pineda is uniquely skilled at juggling a lot of projects at once. This is a requirement for independent newspaper designers. But during his time as art director for West Of, Erick was also busy running his own bustling design firm, Pineda Design + Photography,
“As a firm believer in seeing locals succeed, I find personal satisfaction in helping Charleston businesses creatively and watching them flourish,” says Erick. “I’m proud to have been a small part of West Of’s evolution, contributing to their brand refresh. West Of is such an integral part of our local scene, keeping the community in touch with relevant topics and fostering meaningful connections.”
Today, Pineda Design + Photography is crushing it with Erick at the helm, bringing a unique vision and innovative approach to local and national clients. Outside of his professional life, Erick enjoys working on cars, including restoring his 1988 Suzuki Samurai.
“I’m also passionate about golf, exploring new destinations with my family, and expanding my culinary skills,” he says. “One of my dreams is to open my own restaurant, blending my love for food and creativity. Above all, I consider my two children, Nico and Isa, to be my most successful designs, and cherish every moment spent with them.”
Brian Whittaker
Advertising Sales, 2005-2007
Before becoming West Of’s first-ever advertising rep, Brian Whittaker and I had met through mutual friends and forged a friendship of our own. At the time, Brian was working his way through college waiting tables at Mondo’s Italian Restaurant on James Island and delivering papers for the Charleston City Paper, where I had worked until early 2005 when I left to start West Of. Brian was one of the first people I reached out to when I did.
“I was about to graduate from CofC in 2005, with a degree in Communications, when Lorne offered me a position in ad sales for his new endeavor, West Of,” recalls Brian. “I saw his deep commitment to local journalism and his inspiration to serve the West Ashley community.”
During his time with the paper, Brian recalls driving up and down Savannah Highway and Ashley River Road, visiting many local businesses and amazing people. In 2007, he married Whitney, and together, they left Charleston to start a new chapter in Richmond, VA.
They renovated an early 1900s house and then moved to the suburbs, where they live with their three sons: Huxley (15), Olsen (13), and Bauer (11). Whitney works as the Finance Director for a former Congresswoman running for Governor of Virginia
“West Of helped launch my passion and a career in marketing that ultimately led to my current role as Senior Vice President at TPN, a global agency under Omnicom,” Brian says. “I am so proud to have been there at the start of West Of.”
Will Shelton
Advertising Sales, 2006-2011
Will Shelton joined the West Of team sometime around Memorial Day of 2006. For three years before that, he had lived in rural Vermont with his then-girlfriend and future wife, Kim, while she attended law school. During that time, Will began his career in sales, working at Eagle Publications out of Claremont, NH, which had five weekly newspapers and the company’s flagship daily paper.
As Kim’s graduation approached, their “What Next” plan started to take shape. After three Vermont winters spent taking photos of used cars in frigid temperatures, Will says their decision was easy.
“We traded snow for sand and moved to Charleston, where Kim and I had family and friends from her time at the College of Charleston,” he says. One of those friends happened to be yours truly. I had just started West Of the previous year and was excited about the prospect of adding an experienced sales rep to the team. So, I connected Will and offered him a similar sales position as the one he was currently doing in Vermont.
“Navigating change can be tough. The West Of team – Lorne, Lindsey, Akai, Warren, Brian, and Elizabeth—welcomed me warmly and quickly became my surrogate family, my micro-community,” recalls Will. “The job also offered me a great chance to learn more about my new city and meet the small business owners that served as the heart of West Ashley.”
Will worked at the paper for just under five years. “During that time, my wife and I celebrated many firsts: our first house, our first dog, our engagement, our wedding (with many of my West Of colleagues in attendance), and our first pregnancy,” says Will.
Like many soon-to-be parents, Will and Kim reviewed their finances and made the tough decision for him to leave West Of in March 2011, three months before his son was born.
Since then, he’s been at Blackbaud, moving up from an entry-level lead generation role to his current position, where he partners with some of the largest non-profits in the country, helping solve their business problems. Will and Kim welcomed a daughter in 2014 and moved to James Island a few years later, where you can likely find him roaming the sidelines of a soccer field six days a week.
“I still pick up West Of and love reading the fantastic hyperlocal content and seeing many of the advertisers I had the pleasure of working with who are still running ads. I think about my time there and can’t help but smile. The friends, the clients, the happy hours at Voodoo, the anxious wait for the published papers to be delivered, the smell of fresh newsprint and seeing it on my fingertips, and the old-school Westofus Festivus office parties,” says Will, who is still curious as to what exactly a certain attendee had done during one such party that caused him to sneak back in to undo it the following morning out of embarrassment.
“West Of was like a surrogate family – a bridge to building my own family. That’s why I am extremely excited to celebrate it reaching this incredible milestone of 20 years in business! It is a testament to Lorne and Lindsey’s and many other contributors’ hard work, dedication, and commitment,” says Will. “Over the past two decades, they have not only built a successful business but also made a significant impact on the West Ashley community. Cheers to 20 more!”
Nicole Tomer
Advertising Sales, 2012-2016
When Nicole Tomer, then Nicole Lubold, applied to a Now Hiring post for a sales position at West Of, she worked at Mellow Mushroom across the street from our office. She didn’t have any experience in advertising sales, per se, but she was great at talking to people. After chatting with her for a few minutes, you can’t help but feel like you’ve known her forever.
Lindsey and I immediately liked Nicole and hired her on the spot. She immediately became an important part of the West Of family and for the next four years, she sold ads for us, helping West Ashley businesses reach customers right here in their own community. And even though she has since moved on to greener pastures, she and her husband Courtney remain great friends of ours, and it has been exciting watching their own business take off.
Nicole, a Massachusetts native, and Courtney, a Connecticut native, are the creative folks behind Co Hog, who can often be found at the West Ashley House of Brews or The Garden by Charles Towne Fermentory, serving New England-style seafood, like clam fritters, lobster rolls, and their namesake stuffed quahogs, aka stuffies.
Courtney is a Johnson & Wales-trained chef with years of experience in some of Charleston’s top kitchens, such as FIG, Glass Onion, Edmund’s Oast, Home Team BBQ, and Lowland. While he creates CoHog’s delicious food, including inventive specials like Mahi Reubens, whole belly clams, meatball grinders, or his recent riff on a classic North Shore Beef sandwich, Nicole still uses that ad rep charm to sell southerners on traditional New England clam shack fare. When she’s not slinging stuffies from the back of Co Hog’s big red trailer, she works full-time as a project manager at MUSC.
“I will always remember my time working at West Of fondly. Not just for the people I met and the work I did, but for the lifelong friends that I met,” says Nicole, reflecting on her years at the newspaper. “I’m so proud of Lindsey and Lorne for reaching this landmark and we’re happy to support what they do by having an ad for Co Hog every month in the paper. They have always supported us, even helping us design our logo and marketing materials in exchange for a couple quarts of chowder. And that’s what small businesses are all about, supporting each other where they can.”
Carlton Swift
Art Director, 2005-2006
It doesn’t matter how great the stories are or how many ads are sold if there is no way to get all of them on the page. In those early days of West Of, the paper was full of ambition and dreams but lacked certain skills in one department in particular. So, I reached out to talented local graphic artist Carlton Swift, whom I had worked with for several years at the City Paper. Like me, Carlton had recently left City Paper and agreed to step in and help with the ad building and the publication’s layout and design for a little while.
What was supposed to only be a couple of weeks turned into a couple of years. Beyond creating all of the ads and making the editorial content look good, Carlton was invaluable in helping install organizational systems that are still in place at the paper today.
If you ask him what he’s been up to since then, Carlton will reluctantly tell you about his career as a freelance graphic designer. If you ask about his community work, he’ll excitedly tell you about his passion for designing a better West Ashley. And if you ask his wife, she’ll tell you he’s in the backyard next to his grill trying to design a better plate of barbecue.
“Working at West Of helped me discover the near-infinite number of opportunities to improve our community,” says Carlton. “I’m grateful to have met, and to continue to meet, so many residents with a passion to guide West Ashley into the future. And West Of has been a huge part of that.”
Akai Antia-obong
Art Director, 2006-2013
We always knew we had Carlton on loan, so when he finally did move on, we set out to hire a new designer, ideally one who would be with us for the long haul. So, we had candidates come into the office for a design “test.” This involved building an ad from scratch and maybe a couple of other fairly basic design tasks, which should have been pretty easy for anyone with a lick of experience in graphic design. Surprisingly, it was not so simple for some of the applicants.
After several less-than-stellar candidates strolled through the office, Akai Antia-obong rolled in to the office with confidence and swagger. He knocked out a dynamite test ad in a matter of minutes and easily cruised through the other parts of the test. He was clearly head and shoulders above anyone else who we had interviewed for the position.
Since we usually carved out about an hour for the “test” and Akai did it in about a quarter of that time, I told him there was a second part to the test he didn’t know about. The entire staff walked across the street to Voodoo Tiki Bar & Lounge. This was not actually part of the test, but he rolled with it, and we had several drinks and got to know each other better. It was clear to everyone that Akai was going fit in perfect with the West Of crew.
Akai would go on to be our Art Director for the better part of a decade. He and I spent countless late nights at the old West Of office putting the issues to bed. I’m so grateful for his time with the paper and even more grateful that we’ve remained close after all these years.
“When I joined West Of in my mid-20s, I didn’t know that it would become my extended family,” says Akai. “We were all so young with strong opinions, big dreams, boundless energy, and tons of interests. Amazingly, we shared it all, and while we collaborated weekly to put out issue after issue, we also forged bonds that will last a lifetime. We have struggled together, celebrated together, and also said goodbye to loved ones together. I will always treasure our time together.”
Akai now uses his creative energies in completely different ways. A skilled chef who, when not chasing his two sons around, stays busy doing private cooking events and can usually be found behind the bar at The Post House in Mt. Pleasant, where he is regarded as one of the most talented mixologists in the Charleston area.
Andrew Sprague
Art Director, 2022-2024
Lindsey and I first met Andrew Sprague at the Oak Barrel Tavern, which was located just a few doors down from our office in the Avondale Business District. At the time, we were all regulars at the little beer bar (now All My Exes). So when the paper suddenly found itself without a designer, Andrew stepped up to save the day.
A creative force in Charleston, Andrew combines his passions for design, storytelling, and photography into a career that’s left a mark on the region’s media scene. With years of experience in graphic design and production, he’s worked on everything from business journals to branding projects for local craft breweries.
Since 2020, Andrew has run ABSprague Graphic Design, helping small businesses bring their visual identities to life while also lending his expertise to media archiving and management. During this time, Andrew also worked as the ad designer for West Of Free Press. Before that, he spent nearly a decade as a graphic designer at SC Biz News, GateHouse Media, and Gannett, crafting print and digital media that ranged from magazines to animations. His knack for clean, impactful design has earned him multiple first-place awards from the South Carolina Press Association.
Andrew studied at Ball State University in Muncie, IN, before making the Lowcountry of South Carolina his home. When he’s not deep in design projects, you’ll find him enjoying Charleston and taking in the city’s energy and events. Living in North Charleston, Andrew continues to bring fresh ideas and creative solutions to the media world, all while keeping things fun and visually striking.
