By Christina Leslie | Correspondent
Thanks to a long-ago recommendation from a Trenton shepherd, Walter Leo Sikorski has kept abreast of faith-based local, diocesan, state, national and international news through the pages of The Monitor for more than 50 years.
As a member of St. Anthony of Padua Parish, Hightstown, Sikorski, 76, began subscribing to the diocesan newspaper not long after its inception in early 1954 by Bishop George W. Ahr.
“I guess I am one of the originals,” Sikorski said of his long readership. “Bishop Ahr had recommended people subscribe to The Monitor. I liked it because it involved coverage of the whole Diocese.”
Sikorski earned a degree in education from Trenton State College, Ewing, (now The College of New Jersey) in 1962. He continued his close ties to the institution, eventually becoming the president of its alumni association and creating charitable gift annuities to benefit the TCNJ School of Education. He explained his philanthropy, saying, modestly, “We were the first generation to go to college.”
For 35 years, Sikorski taught English and social studies in N.J. public high schools, from South Brunswick to Trenton to North Brunswick. Sikorski also taught youth religious education in the St. Anthony of Padua summer camp programs.
The never-married Catholic served as a delegate for presidential nominee Jimmy Carter at the National Convention in 1976 in Madison Square Garden, New York.
“I had always told people to get involved in their community,” Sikorski said. “When I retired from teaching Social Studies, I took my own advice and ran for councilman.” The former teacher served on the Hightstown town council from 2003 to2010.
After his retirement, he travelled to Ireland, Italy and Spain, but all the while read The Monitor for up-to-date Catholic news.
Over the course of the 50-year subscription, Sikorski has received more than 1,000 issues and lived through the terms of four Trenton Diocese shepherds: Bishops Ahr, John C. Reiss, John M. Smith and David M. O’Connell, C.M.
The retired English teacher noted the newspaper has improved over its long tenure.
“It has been even better lately from a journalistic standpoint,” Sikorski said. “It has more special-interest articles and more comprehensive coverage. It is more appealing.”
Numerous awards over its storied history prove his assertion. This past June, The Monitor ranked first place in general excellence in its circulation category by the Catholic Press Association of the United States and Canada, the third time in five years that the newspaper has received the top-of-class award.
Sikorski admitted he has read articles on the newspaper’s website, trentonmonitor.com, but asserted, “I find the print edition more appealing; I like to hold it in my hand. I guess I’m an old-fashioned guy.”