We’ll be celebrating a major milestone with the next issue of the Gypsy Journal, which will mark ten years of fulltiming and publishing the world’s only nationwide RV publication produced and distributed entirely on the road. We’re pretty darned proud of that.
Looking back, I can still remember the moment the Gypsy Journal was born in my mind. We were sitting at our kitchen table, back home in Show Low, Arizona, brainstorming ideas to make a living in this new mobile lifestyle that we wanted to become a part of.
We discussed several options, when a light suddenly went off in my head, and I told Miss Terry “We’re going to publish an RV newspaper, and it’s not going to be like any other RV publication out there. No slick pages full of ads, no columns written by outsiders, just a folksy little rag about the things we see on the back roads, and the folks we meet along the way. We’ll call it the Gypsy Journal!”
And that was that! A few weeks later we had produced our very first issue and hit the road. You can read about how this all came about on our website at the page titled And So We Hit the Road.
We’ve seen a lot of changes in ten years. When we started out, digital cameras were in their infancy. We mostly used 35mm film cameras, and if we shot a roll of film for a story, we might be hundreds of miles away before we got it developed. If those photos turned out bad, we were really in a bind! Now we use digital cameras, and can see the pictures instantly to know if we have the shot we want.
For the first four years, we produced the Gypsy Journal the old fashioned way, printing things off on a laser printer, laying every page out manually on large grid sheets, affixing the photos and stories to the grid sheets with hot wax, and using a portable drafting table and a T-square to make sure everything was straight. Then we took those grid sheets to a newspaper printer to be photographed and have the plates made to run the job. These days we lay the entire edition out on a computer screen, save it to a CD, and send that to the printer. As frustrating as computers and their programs can be, they have made our work much easier.
We’ve been very blessed. That flash of inspiration all those years ago has turned into a successful little business that has allowed us to live this wonderful lifestyle for years, and even though we’ll never get rich from it, if you measure riches in terms of money in the bank, we wouldn’t trade what we have for a million bucks.
And we know that we could never have done it without your support, in subscribing to the Gypsy Journal, buying the books and RVing guides we produce, clicking those little ads on our websites, and coming to our rallies. Thank you for helping make our dream come true.
Thought For The Day – There is only one success – to be able to live your life in your own way.
Nick Russell
World-Famous, New York Times Best Selling Author, and All-Around Nice Guy!
Congrats Nick and Terry!
And we thank you Nick. For your knowledge, honesty and most of all wonderful sense of humor. You have prevented many of us from making the same mistakes that you have made. When we “hit the road” in September of this year we do so with much of the knowledge that you have given us. You always take the time to respond to people’s questions and emails. I never start my day without reading your blog.
Safe travels and here’s (I’m lifting my coffee cup) to another 10 years on the road.
CONGRATULATIONS Nick and Terry!! Well done!! If thats not a success story, I never heard one. keep on truckin!!!
Mike (&Pat)
We just wish we had subscribed years ago. Thanks for what y’all do!
Barry and Joyce
Weeki Wachee, FL (for now)
Congratulations on your publishing milestone. I’d like to say we were charter subscribers, but we’re really refugees from Two Lane Roads. The publisher of this defunct newspaper fliped our unused subscription to your excellent publication when he ceased operations. I hope the RV makers who are going bankrupt do as well by their orphans.
Keep up the good work, and travel safe.
Congratulations to you both on this important milestone! I’ve only been a Gypsy Journal subscriber for about 5 years, but I enjoy every issue, as well as your daily blog and rallies. It’s great that technology changes have made it easier for you (in some ways, barring this last change in printing format), and I hope you’ll continue for a long time. Keep up the good work!
We add our congrats to the rest here, Nick & Terry. Such a great publication by really great folks. Thanks for your humor, honesty, and wisdom. Mostly thanks for sharing your heart! See you in Ohio!
Add us to the list of congratulations! When we saw that stack of every issue of Gypsy Journal at your Arizona rally, we were terrifically impressed with your output, just as we are terrifically impressed by every issue and by you guys as well.
More congratulations to you from us. Keep up the great work. We have enjoyed the Gypsy Journal for many years and are looking forward to many more. We also really enjoy the Rallys. We are planing to attend our first Eastern Rally this fall.
Phil B.
Your are Great. And so is your site! Awesome content. Good job guys! Interesting article, adding it to my favourites!