This year, Lumen’s current staff members, former staff members, and readers celebrate that Lumen has turned 70 years old. Lumen, Viterbo’s newspaper, was founded in 1954 by Sr. Celestine Cepress, who also founded Viterbo’s literary and art magazine, Touchstone, in 1947. Lyon Evans, who was the advisor for the Lumen for 27 of his 30 years at Viterbo, said that Sr. Celestine was also the first faculty member to be named Teacher of the Year.
The Lumen has been consistently in existence since its founding with a couple of exceptions. It is a student newspaper funded by the Student Government Association (SGA) and anyone on campus is welcome to join the staff. The Viterbo English department provides the advisor for the newspaper. Lumen’s current advisor is Dr. Jackie Herbers, the current Chair of English and World Languages as well as an associate professor of English.
The Lumen has endured through tough times. Herbers says that she is especially proud of the staff that made it through the COVID-19 pandemic. The advisor at the time, Herbers says, “I had thought about allowing them to stop publishing for a while, because it was a very stressful time. Trying to do all of your classes online and then getting all of your homework in was difficult, but they didn’t give up. They said, ‘no, we want to keep doing articles,’ and they thought the pandemic was important to cover, and I supported them. While we weren’t able to publish a print newspaper because we weren’t [on campus], we still published them online. They did a great job. And so, through all the ups and downs and tough times, Lumen has endured.”
The Lumen staff have been busy celebrating the 70th anniversary of the newspaper. Recently, members of the current staff recreated one of the original photos of the Lumen staff and Sr. Celestine from 1954. The staff have debuted an anniversary banner and new T-shirts, as well as being more active in campus-organized fairs and new advertising. The staff have also reprinted the first issue that the Lumen ever published, which is currently available around campus to read.
Looking to the future for the Lumen, Herbers says that she would love to continue building the journalism program at Viterbo. “We could…promote journalism a little bit more as an actual career path for people. It is a real thing that…you can do with your writing when you graduate,” says Herbers. She also says that she would like the Lumen to start working more closely and collaborating with El Sol, Viterbo’s Spanish newspaper. Another possibility for the future is for Lumen to publish issues more often.
To any students who may be considering joining the Lumen staff, the current staff encourage them to go for it. Herbers says, “Even if you’re a little afraid that your writing isn’t up to the standards, this is a supportive environment. I’m going to always do my best to help students learn the craft of writing various news articles.” The Lumen is a great community for students to enjoy each other’s company and support each other through the writing process, while improving their own writing at the same time.
The Lumen staff would like to give a profound thank you to all of our readers for supporting our newspaper. Herbers says, “Being able to be the advisor for this publication has meant a lot to me, and we can’t do [it] without the people who read our articles. So, my sincerest thank you to everyone, and my hope is that we can just continue the legacy of Sr. Celestine and be good stewards of what she founded.”
