December 13,2015
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, the Ridgewood blog is the lone independent voice of headline news in North Jersey . While much larger competitors have
come and gone the Ridgewood blog has persevered with your help. The Ridgewood blog is a unique social experiment were readers have the ability to create and determine what news matters most to them. With your support the blog has been mindbogglingly successful and its because of reader participation that has made it so .It is a unique interaction experiment in community dialogue .
We appreciate and are grateful for all the contributions made by readers and from the suggestion of several readers would like to
extend readers an opportunity to become patrons . The patron program is open to all . For as little as $25 you can become a patron .Patrons
will be listed d on the side bar or like always chose to remain anonymous. Contributions of $250 or more receive a special gift ,which
will be sent out in January . Every little bit helps , from contributions to content.
The response to our recent email was very gratifying !
for those that wish to contribute
paypal :
onlyonesmallvoice@gmail.com
or if you prefer checks can be sent James Foytlin PO Box 227 Ridgewood NJ 07451
The funds will be used to offset IT services which have been a bit
staggering the last couple of years .
Founders Day : the History of the Ridgewood blog
the History of the Ridgewood blog
Monday, October 26, 2009
The Ridgewood blog ( https://theridgewoodblog.blogspot.com/ ) was founded in March of 2006 by James J Foytlin aka PJ Blogger .[1] Mr.
Foytlin was born and raised in Ridgewood ,New Jersey and is a graduate of Ridgewood High School .[2] [3]
After many years living in New York City[4] Mr Foytlin returned to Ridgewood after a divorce and the tragic events of 9/11 . Once he
settled in he noticed a lack of sufficient news coverage of local events . One day a friend from Brazil[5] showed him her home town on
the internet and to Mr. Foytlin’s great surprise when he tried to reciprocate he was utterly dismayed at the absolute lack of coverage
of his home town. After all Ridgewood is only 18 miles from midtown Manhattan[6] the media capital of world and there was not a single
picture of Ridgewood to be found . How could this be? Ridgewood is a picturesque upper middle class village of around 25,000 located in
Bergen county in northern New Jersey[7] . Founded by Dutch settlers before it became an English colony[8] . The town or village as its
called is steeped in rich history and tradition .Known for a large amount of Victorian era housing , a quality school system and a family
friendly atmosphere.
Though busy getting reacquainted with his home town the fact that the Village of Ridgewood was so under represented on the internet
continued to disturb Mr. Foytlin. Mr. Foytlin had been writing news letters for his job in financial services since the mid 1990’s . The
popular flip, off beat investment strategy news letters had become email blasts with the advent of readily accessible internet.[9] By
2004 the email blasts were converted into blog format for the One Small Voice blog ( https://onesmallvoice.blogspot.com/ ). [10]
Around that time the Village of Ridgewood had finally completed it’s much anticipated and long delayed renovation of the Village hall which
has been flooded out due to Hurricane Floyd.[11] The renovation was marred by huge cost over runs and lengthy delays. In 2005 it opened
with great fan fare , was once again flooded with the very first rain . Mr. Foytlin was more shocked by the abject lack of responsibilitytaken by elected officials than the fact that the $9 million dollar renovation had to some extent been a failure . That was the breaking
point and Mr. Foytlin had had enough so he decided to give , citizen journalism a go and created the Ridgewood blog in March of 2006. [12]
The birth of PJ Blogger .By this time Blogging its seems had become quite the rage and mainstream news anchors such as Dan Rather had
questioned the validity of information from non professionals sitting around in their Pajama’s blogging.[13] Mr. Foytlin not a fan of Dan
Rather or any of the mainstream media decided to blog under the name PJ Blogger as a play on words and to plant himself firmly in the camp
of the new digital media.
Innovations by the Ridgewood blog to citizen journalism.
“The Fly” is a column on the Ridgewood blog the originates from the expression ,”I’d like to be a fly on the wall “ . The idea is that
every citizen has both a unique perspective and experience and these two factors can be used to gather news and opinions about local
issues. Originally only of handful of people in town participated but with time the Ridgewood blog can now count on 20–40 semi regular
contributors. These post are both anonymous and signed and are largely opinion as well a breaking news.[14]
The Ridgewood blog brings a free market lassie fare point of view to local issues . Mr. Foytlin aka PJ Blogger has stated that for local
issues there are only two kinds of people ;the ones who say spend what every you want because I will not be around to pay the bill and the
second group which are more focused on the ,”be careful this is my money your spending” . The Ridgewood blog is dedicated to the
interplay of there two groups.[15]
[1][12] the Ridgewood blog website https://theridgewoodblog.blogspot.com/
[2] Birth Certificate born in Valley Hospital , Ridgewood 04/09/1962
[3] Ridgewood High School Class 1980
[4] 444 East 86th street ,530 East 72nd
[5] Monica Rocha
[6] Mapquest
[7] United States 2000 Census, the village population was 24,936.
[8] https://www.americantowns.com/nj/ridgewood/organization/village-of-ridgewood
[9] Fahnestock & Co. now Oppenheimer & Co.
[10] https://onesmallvoice.blogspot.com/
[11] https://www.ridgewoodlibrary.org/localhistory/lh_vh_pease.htm
[13] https://www.opinionjournal.com/diary/?id=110005611
[14] [15] James J Foytlin
