Today is Pulitzer Monday, when the Pulitzer Organization and Columbia University announces the winners of the annual Pulitzer Prizes, considered to be the highest honors of the news business.

In honor of the occasion, I’d like to share the story of Mel Ruder, a small-town newspaper editor whose hard work led him to become the first journalist in Montana to win the coveted award.

Ruder was just of the Navy when he moved to the Flathead Valley area of Montana, near Glacier National Park, to start a weekly newspaper. He promised to fill it with photographs of “babies, beasts, and beauties” and lots of positive news, according to Pictures, a Park and a Pulitzer, a photo book showcasing his work published in 2000.

Ruder worked long hours, and according to the book, eventually assembled a small staff of full-time and part-time reporters and editors. At some point, he moved the paper’s operations to a log-cabin office on the corner of Hwy 2, just outside of Columbia Falls, where it still stands. That’s the office in the picture at the top of this post, which I took last month during a trip to the area.

Mel Ruder. Photo courtesy Great Falls Tribune

In June 1964, when heavy rains flooded the valley, Ruder was all over the story. “He went out on the floodwaters in a boat, and when the road was washed out he drove his car down the railroad tracks to photograph flood scenes,” the New York Times wrote in his 2000 obituary. “He worked day and night for nearly a week, feeding news steadily to The Associated Press and radio stations in the area.”

He even hitched rides on small planes to get aerial views of the damage, according to Pictures, a Park and a Pulitzer.

To keep local readers up with the events, he printed as many as 12,550 copies of the Hungry Horse News a day, compared with normal circulation of 3,900 a week.

Ruder was proud of the work he and his staff did covering the flood, and asked a journalist friend in Missoula to submit a nomination to the Pulitzer committee on their behalf.

The following April, Ruder was at work, photographing a local school event, when he got a call. For their coverage of the flood, the Hungry Horse News had received the Pulitzer Prize for Distinguished General Local Reporting, making them the first journalists in the state to be so honored.

When asked how he felt about receiving such as prestigious award, he said – on more than one occasion, according to the book – “I guess I can die now.”

Instead, Ruder continued to work at the newspaper until he sold it and retired in 1978.

Before last month, I’d never heard of Ruder or the Hungry Horse News, named after a small town not much more than a gas station, grocery store and a handful of shops where tourists can buy huckleberry jam or huckleberry pie or just about anything else made with huckleberries on their way to Glacier National Park.

While staying in the area, I saw Pictures, a Park and a Pulitzer a couple different places and was intrigued enough that I asked to borrow a copy so I could read more.

I can imagine that there are many modern day Mel Ruders who hired on at AOL’s Patch.com or a local independent news website to cover local news hoping that one day, if they were lucky, they’ll be called on to cover a natural disaster, strike, riot or some other significant story that could make their career and even win an award.

Could it happen? Sure. Will it happen? Given the realities of today’s news business, it’d be tough. Ruder called his own shots. He didn’t have to check in with the head of digital content in New York for permission to spend extra on hiring or other expenses.

Ruder’s Pulitzer story is worth remembering not only as a reminder that hyperlocal news was being practiced long before there was a Patch.com. When it comes to community journalism, the bar doesn’t have to be set artificially low.

My second newspaper job was at another community newspaper publisher, this one a chain of Los Angeles neighborhood weeklies that seemed to specialize in grocery store ads – at least that’s how it felt to me, as one of the paste up artists putting the ads together.

Those stints gave me an appreciation for community papers, one I was happy to revisit when I reported on the health of small daily and weekly newspapers here in Oregon for a story in the February 2009 issue of Oregon Business magazine. My conclusion: although times are tough for newspapers of all sizes, small papers are in a better position to survive the current economic downturn and changes in the newspaper industry than the big metro dailies.

You can read the entire story here: The Smalltown News.

As print advertising continues to plummet and online ads have yet to pick up the slack, papers are cutting frequency, shrinking geographic distribution, laying off workers – really doing anything and everything they can to cut costs – and anticipating more of the same next year. If some of them don’t fold first, which is a distinct possibility.

One bright spot in an otherwise bleak business is what’s happening at the community level, where news blogs or aggregators are popping up all over the country. Whatever you call them – online newspapers, community microblogs or something else – many are run by former staff reporters or editors, and in some cases long-time freelancers who see a gap in local news left by newspapers’ shrinking coverage.

I recently talked to Gillin, a long-time tech writer & editor turned blogger, author and social media pundit, about the news business and the role one- and two-person operations are playing in the industry. Here are some highlights of our conversation, edited for length and clarity.

We hear a lot about the plight of the country’s major dailies, but what’s happening with smaller community newspapers?

It’s very tough for them right now, as publishers like Gannett are closing them outright in an effort to save money. The weeklies just aren’t seen as being worth the attention of these big companies. They’re trying to save the big titles that are seen as more profitable. It’s kind of a split personality because there are small newspapers starting up successfully with a low budget and bootstrapping and serving very specific geographic areas or demographics.

Where does online community news fit in?

You’re finding a lot of individuals who are becoming community publishers. They may not have a print edition but it’s not a stretch to see them going in that direction, as the major dailies provide less valuable content.

A lot of these are mini versions of Drudge Report, lots of linking to other stuff. There’s an opportunity for someone who can aggregate around their area and consolidate it in one source. If I’m a local high school theater group I probably have a website, and if someone can put that together with other local information they add some value.

What are some of these online community news sites?

Neighborsgo.com out of Dallas is a really interesting experiment in community journalism, with 18 local editions generated by readers. Newzjunky is a one-man publisher in Watertown, New York, who is driving the local community paper nuts. There’s a guy I’ve written about my own hometown, Hopkinton, Massachusetts, started a Website called Hop News. He’s one guy. He’s a photographer, he goes around the town and documents what’s happening. He’s been at it five years now being a one man band. Is he making a living? He complements it with his photography business, but it’s a profitable business.

There’s a lot of talk of news organizations trying new revenue models to supplement advertising and subscriptions. Are online community news sites doing that?

A lot of ideas are being tried at the local level that can’t be tried at the big papers because they’re not nimble enough to accomplish it. Small publications are able to innovate more. Their overhead is so low, they don’t need a lot to survive.

Here’s a couple other places to read up on what’s happening in the industry:

Reflections of a Newsosaur

TheMediaIsDying