Eugene Skiba was a "very quiet guy," family members said, but his voice had a big presence in the city of New Brighton, where for nearly three decades he worked as a reporter and editor of the New Brighton Bulletin.
Skiba was the "conscience of New Brighton," covering everything from school board and city council meetings to high school basketball. He wrote a widely read weekly column for the paper called "This and Data" and never missed a deadline, said Jim Schwartz, a former Bulletin reporter who later became its editor.
"He understood the importance of a reporter and editor being in the community and how to get to the basics of what was happening," Schwartz said.
Skiba died from complications of Parkinson's disease Friday at the New Brighton Care Center. He was 85.
Skiba was born in Mounds View Township and graduated in 1941 from the former Marshall High School in Minneapolis. He served as a navigator in the Air Force during World War II and "knew all the stars and constellations," said one of his daughters, Laurie Skiba of Edenville, Wash.
After the war, Eugene Skiba went to work as a rural mail carrier in what is now the city of Lexington. He met his wife of 50 years, Vernice, on the job. He also helped his brothers run a gas station and worked on Beisswenger's farm, now a hardware store on Long Lake Road.
The birth of 'This and Data'
A desire to write and a sense of public service led him into journalism, one year at the Rose Tribune in Roseville and 29 as a reporter and editor at the New Brighton Bulletin. In "This and Data," he offered his opinions and held governing bodies to high standards, but tried to remain as objective as possible, Laurie said.
