This is not a government publication!

Anonymous — November 1983

Every day, several people write to The Peace Calendar with suggestions for articles. The peace movement is involved in literally thousands of Important (newsworthy) projects, and we agree that we should be covering them all.

In the first week of each month, the Editorial Board of The Peace Calendar convenes and tries to decide which of these projects most need to be covered — not an easy task. We expanded to eight pages because it was necessary, not because we could afford to. We couldn’t even afford the old four-page format.

But we’re still swamped with letters requesting more analytical articles, more features, more resources, more news, more events listings, and so on. All of these things cost money. Printing alone costs us $50 for every thousand copies. Two CANDIS people are on small salaries, but salaries are what we cut first when we run out of money, which happens frequently.

Printing and salaries are only the beginning. Typesetting, supplies, phones and more — it’s expensive to put out a monthly newspaper.

The Peace Calendar’s production duo, our writers and editors, and our distribution and advertising volunteers have collectively produced a professional paper that reflects well on the peace movement. Their commitment has paid off. Or has it?

The outcome is a paper that appears to be well funded. The talent and dedication of our staff is working against us. Our readers think that The Peace Calendar happens by Itself. We’ve said it before, but we’ll say it again, this time more clearly: WE ARE NOT WELL FUNDED!

Our creditors need not worry: we will always pay our debts. But our readers must not assume that The Peace Calendar will live up to its mandate without their support.

We don’t care how you do it, but we hope you’ll help us. If you have no money, come learn how to set type and do paste-up. Or work with our distribution committee. Or sell ads.

We’ve thought of leaving a page blank, with a little message saying that we don’t have enough money to set the type for the articles that were supposed to appear on that page. We hope we won’t have to resort to measures that drastic. In all your letters and phone calls, you have indicated that The Peace Calendar is vital to the Canadian peace movement. We hope you’ll pay more than lip service to disarmament.

We thank you in advance. We promise you’ll see results!

The Editors

The Peace Calendar

Canadian Disarmament Information Service, 1983-1984

This is not a government publication!