Today is my 12th anniversary at OnMilwaukee.com. So, forgive me if I've written a version of this post before. Who can remember? In the dozen years I've been in this chair, OnMilwaukee.com has posted nearly 30,000 articles, briefs and blogs, a good few of them mine.
When I arrived there were six of us, not counting interns. A month before there were just four and a few months before that only the three founders were sailing the then-wobbly ship. Now we're nearly 20.
What seems crazy – and poignant – to me is that when I was pondering applying, I feared that this whole Internet thing might prove short-lived and I'd be left at sea.
Maybe, I thought, I should just keep my not terribly cushy, but very comfortable office job creating print ads, newsletters, signage, a web site and working on author events at Harry W. Schwartz Bookshop. It didn't pay enough, but the people were great, I believed in what we were doing and, hey, bookshops aren't going anywhere, are they?
Now, of course, Schwartz Bookshops are no more (much to my disappointment) and OnMilwaukee.com has just come off its best year since the onset of the recession (during which we laid off no one and cut no one's pay).
On July 3, 2000, only Andy Tarnoff was in the office. I brought a dozen doughnuts, thinking there'd be an office full of hungry OnMilwaukee.comrades. I think we slowly ate our way through them, but I hope I'm wrong about that.
At some point, my wife called and asked how the new job was going. "Andy just walked by in shorts, with no shoes on, kicking a beach ball," I told her.
Things are a little more formal around here now, but, I'm happy to say, just a little more formal.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
