Word has been received of the death this weekend of writer-editor Nila Aamoth, who was editor of the Wayland Globe from 1986 to 2005. She was 81.

Aamoth and her husband, Ronald Carlson, purchased the Wayland Globe in 1986 from Irv and Helen Jame Helmey, becoming just the fourth owners of the weekly publication, which was started in 1884, by George Mosher, passed along to his son, Rollo G. Mosher, who was succeeded in 1953 by the Helmeys.

Aamoth and Carlson had been owners of their own Gun Lake-area weekly newspaper, the Penasee Press. They merged the two into what became known as the Penasee Globe until it was terminated in 2019 by the Advance Newspapers group.  

Aamoth wrote her first story at age 4 “and never stopped plying the pencil, the typewriter, and finally the computer keyboard,” according to a Goodreads online review prompted by her publishing her book, “The Daughters Lem.”

She began her journalism career in Houston before taking over the Globes in Michigan. Along the way, she published her column she called “A Nickel’s Worth.”

”I figured my thoughts were more valuable than the traditional penny, so I called my weekly column ‘A Nickel’s Worth’,”

Those mostly light-hearted musings won her numerous state and national writing awards. Her editorials, both humorous and serious, won the Michigan Press Association award for “Best Editorial” two years running.

“I believed I could write about anything,” she told Goodreads. “But writing the incredible story of my own family was almost too heart-wrenching. I think I’ve finally grown up!”

After she retired from her journalism career in 2005, she continued as a writing consultant.

“My primary goal as a long-time newspaper editor with a ‘stable’ of writers has always been to preserve the style and intent of the writer while carefully crafting their word/thought presentation. This goal toward communications perfection has translated well in the corporate world. The firms and individuals who have benefitted from my special brand of polish include communicators, retail marketers and start-up enterprises, as well as aspiring fiction and nonfiction writers.”

“The Daughters Lem,” released by Booktrope Publishing, is a true story about the dysfunctional family of Aamoth’s mother, Dorothy, who held a terrible secret in her heart for six decades.

“It is a true story of a woman who refused to be defined by the childhood terror of witnessing her parents’ murder-suicide,” Aamoth said. “It is my mother’s story told through my perspective and that of her siblings, lovers and children who never knew her many secrets until after she was gone.”

Sheand Carlson most recently lived in the Gun Lake area, where she enjoyed gardening, golfing and “generally goofing around.”

Details about funeral arrangements and visitation are expected soon.