Longtime newspaperman Edgar Dunning has seen many fine staff come and go in the almost 90-year history of the Delta Optimist.

Still writing a weekly column looking at the history of the community, Dunning, who turned a sprightly 100 this year, was recently asked about the plethora of characters he worked with for the publication his family started in 1922.

"The staff always told me how much they enjoyed working at the Optimist during my period. We had some good ones," said Dunning in an interview at his Ladner home/office.

The Dunning family arrived in Delta in 1922 at the invitation of the board of trade, which wanted someone to start a local newspaper. The community had been without a paper since the Delta Times folded a few years earlier.

Dunning's father, Vincent Dunning, started the Optimist but a year into the venture left the country after an indiscretion. Dunning's mother, Gertrude Dunning, took over as publisher, becoming one of the few female publishers in Canada at the time.

Edgar assumed the role publisher in 1942, following his mother's death, and saw the staff complement grow as the Optimist firmly established itself as one of the leading community newspapers. He sold half interest in the paper in 1964 and continued as a co-publisher for a few years. He sold the remainder of his interest in 1980.

Still remembering the names of employees during his days at the helm, the personable Dunning said many reporters and editors were from England, coming to Delta to hone their skills.

"A number of them started with us because it was near Vancouver and we were frequently looking for competent people to be reporters and editors."

Dunning, a very good reporter and linotype operator himself, recalled how those who came from England were speedy typists who also had superb shorthand. One, Denis Williams, would later become the clerk for the Supreme Court of the Yukon Territory.

One of the former editors from England, Linton Eccles, became active with the Lower Fraser River Crossing Improvement Association, a group lobbying for a new crossing between Richmond and South Delta, resulting in the construction of the Deas Island Tunnel (now called George Massey Tunnel).

Eccles passed away a few weeks before the 1956 announcement a tunnel would be built. His ashes would be scattered on the Fraser River at the site of the new tunnel.

One of the most interesting characters over the years was reporter George Palmer, who left the Optimist in the 1940s to write for the Moscow Daily News in Russia. An ardent communist, Palmer sent a few letters of his experiences back to Delta where they were published.

Saying Palmer was a good writer and reporter, Dunning recalled that as soon as Palmer applied for a passport "all the excitement broke out" at the office.

"In those days, anybody applying to work in a communist country alerted the RCMP, so every one of us connected with Palmer at the Optimist was investigated by the police, with Palmer too. Eventually he got his passport and worked in Moscow for a couple of years before coming back to Vancouver."

Saying he didn't know Palmer was a communist when hired by the Optimist, Dunning laughed that it wouldn't have mattered.

"We had one other member of our staff at that time who, you might not have called him a communist, was an ardent socialist. He was an excellent printer but also a member of the CCF. In those days, a good person on linotype was a valuable thing to have."

Another staffer, an advertising representative, turned out to be a pyromaniac. He was suspected, but never convicted, of burning down the Delta Community Hall in 1964. He was later convicted of setting a building fire in Point Roberts, and that's when Dunning began to realize the salesman might have been responsible for acts in Delta.

Another interesting person who worked for the Optimist in the 1940s was Pop White, an excellent printer and linotype operator.

"I don't know if he was single or otherwise, but we never heard of any wife or family," remembered Dunning. "He worked all day long, go out and have his meals and would then sleep at night on the shelf under the (newspaper) makeup table," said Dunning.

"That would continue for a couple of weeks and he'd take off for Vancouver, disappear more like it, and we wouldn't see him for a couple of weeks. Nature's wants are very few and they must be attended to, and he took off to satisfy his wants, we suspected, in the red light district in Vancouver."

Dunning said he kept in touch with many former staffers over the years. One person he still keeps in touch with is former bookkeeper Phyllis Piper, who is actor Michael J. Fox's mother.