Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1507383
6 SEPT. 16, 2023 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED LETTER FROM THE PUBLISHER ✦ STU COMAN O n Friday, Feb. 28, 2009, I received a call from Michelle DeLee-Hamil- ton, the general manager of Blue & Gold Illustrated, which had the largest cir- culation of any team-specific college publication in the country. "I may have to come work for you," she said. I asked why. "The company is being sold," she ex- plained. "Has it been sold yet?" I asked. "No, but they are talking to buyers," said Michelle. "Is it too late to get involved," I ques- tioned. "I will see," she replied. It wasn't, and for the next two months, we were negotiating on details, trying to line up a bank loan and travel- ing to South Bend several times to learn more about the operations and talk to key people. The sale was closed on May 7, 2009. When we were in the initial stages of eventually buying Blue & Gold Illus- trated, I met with Lou Somogyi for the first time. I introduced myself by telling him what our company did, including pub- lishing magazines at NC State, Virginia and Michigan. "I always wondered why we couldn't be like The Wolverine," said Lou, hold- ing up one of the sample copies of the Michigan magazine that I had given him. "That will be the goal if we become the owners," I promised him. We doubled the size of the publica- tion, stapled it like a magazine, added full color to every page and instituted new editorial approaches, including the up-front notes section, coverage of Notre Dame's professional athletes and an extended Olympic sports section. We also converted the football pre- view magazine from a 72-page news- print format to a 160-page glossy mag- azine — and we moved into a new office less than a mile from campus. We were honored to be the publish- ers of Blue & Gold Illustrated and were committed to making the publication and operation better. THE TWEET In October 2014, college football an- nouncer Chris Fowler sent out this note on Twitter: I called Lou after I saw it and said, "We did it Lou, thanks to you." As usual, he deferred the credit to our staff. They were a part of the success, but Lou was the driving force. We all had worked together to take Blue & Gold Illustrated to the level that we both dis- cussed five years earlier. I often took home an issue of Blue & Gold Illustrated and looked over it as a fan without the pressure of editing pages. I always marveled at how damn good Lou was and how impressed I was with "his" magazine. OUR STAFFS During the 12-plus years that Coman Publishing owned Blue & Gold Illustrated, we were fortunate to have an exceptional group of employees (many who have been very successful after leaving us) and a special vendor: Lou Somogyi — On April 17, 2021, I received a heartbreaking call from Michelle DeLee-Hamilton, the advertising sales director for Blue & Gold Illustrated. She informed me that Lou had been found dead in his car that morning in the parking lot of the ten- nis club where he played the sport he loved. The cause of death was a completely blocked artery. He was the only employee to pass away while still working for us. Lou, 58, had written for Blue & Gold Illustrated for 37 years, was the heart and soul of the maga- zine, knew more about Notre Dame football than anyone in the world, had an incredible work ethic and sense of ownership in the company, and was a caring, kind and slightly quirky gentleman. Lou once told me that he had been called a sa- vant when it came to Notre Dame football. "I can tell you who the backup right guard was in the 1992 Navy game, the score and other details of the game, but I can't tell you what I had for breakfast this morning," he explained. The loss was huge on a personal and professional level. I loved Lou as a person and was in awe of the quality and quantity of work he could produce. Michelle DeLee-Hamilton — Michelle had been the general manager of Blue & Gold Illustrated for years, and we wanted her to stay on with us. She joined our team after her third child, Holly, was born. Michelle sells ads, works with Notre Dame Development, maintains our South Bend office and helps with newsstand sales and marketing. She has been an invaluable member of our staff and a joy to work with. Steve Downey — Steve has been the managing editor of Blue & Gold Illustrated since we pur- chased the magazine. We have never missed a Sunday football deadline under his leadership, and he is a major reason we got acknowledged by ESPN's Chris Fowler. Andrew Owens — We hired Andrew straight out of school at Notre Dame, and he did very good work for us. What impressed me the most about him was his strong character and willingness to stand up for what he believed in. He left us to go to law school at Notre Dame and now works in development at the University. He is a first-class young man. Jason Sapp — Jason is a great success story. We were committed to hiring the previous staff, and Jason was one of them. We got off to a rocky start, but he responded to coaching very well (he played football at Notre Dame). A top guy at Scout told me not to hire him, that nobody knew him and he didn't work hard. That changed quickly, with Jason dominating recruiting in the Notre Dame market in less than two years. He was so good Scout tried to hire him away from us. Someone recommended him for a job in medical sales. Competing against a large group of candidates, he landed the job and has been extremely successful. Tom Loy — Tom blew us away on his interview, While Lou was giving him a tour of the campus, he noticed prized running back recruit Elijah Hood outside Brian Kelly's office. When they returned to our office, Tom wrote a post on our message board they got over 2,000 views. We were sold. Tom did a terrific job for us for several years, but when we moved our website from the 247 Sports network Goodbye (Sort Of), And Go Irish!