MONROE — One of Monroe’s most dedicated men died last week. Jim Bruce, longtime General Manager of the Monroe Times, along with a plethora of other employment and volunteer jobs, died on Wednesday, July 16 at age 87 at SSM Health Monroe Hospital.
Bruce was born and raised in Dixon, Illinois, graduating in 1956. In a 2016 Moments in Time feature, he said he liked to play tennis, basketball and cross country in school, as well as playing percussion in the marching and concert bands.
An only child, Bruce recognized at a young age he had a strong interest in creativity tasks.
“There wasn’t a lot of family history in creativity,” he said. “But I enjoyed taking a blank piece of paper and bringing it to life.”
He dabbled for a few years after college working in insurance. However, when a position came up in the advertising department of the Dixon Evening Telegraph (owned by Shaw Newspapers), he took it and soon found his niche. Using his creative mind, he took advertising ideas and put the layouts to paper. Not long after, he started gaining recognition for his work.
The same owners of Dixon Evening Telegraph owned the Monroe Evening Times, and in 1965 he moved to a post north of his hometown.
After finding his footing in Monroe, he never left.
Monroe had a booming downtown and boasted a great location between bigger cities, making for a natural advertising trade, and Bruce had a front row seat as the small town blossomed and grew.
“I fell in love with it right from the start,” he said in 2016. “It was a feeling I had while following the moving van from Dixon to Monroe. As it turned out, it was far more than I could have ever scripted.”
He also enjoyed the work and moved up the ranks quickly. He was promoted to advertising manager in 1966, general manager in 1975 and the dual position of general manager-editor in 1980. By January 1990, Bruce was elected vice president and appointed to the board of directors of Monroe Publishing Co. In all, he worked for the newspaper for 27 years.
In 1985, Bruce kicked off what would be one of his biggest projects, naming it “Feelin’ Good About Monroe” — a campaign to express thoughts on the newspaper business and the town it was highlighting. The promotion earned the Monroe Evening Times a citation from the Wisconsin State Assembly. There were mugs printed, buttons made, stories done but mostly, the campaign made people aware of all that Monroe had to offer. The excitement seemingly caught fire, and the Monroe Evening Times was awarded an award of excellence from the Wisconsin Newspaper Association. In 1987, the city approved a Jim Bruce Day. The same year, he was elected the president of the Wisconsin Newspaper Association, serving on numerous WNA committees.
“I enjoyed being the ambassador for Monroe,” he said. “In 1987, the area was growing. It was an exciting time. I was fortunate to be the catalyst. Monroe truly is very special.”
About three years after retiring, he became bored and opened his own business: Network Cable Advertising. It was a vision that brought television advertising opportunities to the local market. In 1995, he joined Cablevision of Greater Beloit as an independent contractor and provided local advertising time on local cable networks like CNN, ESPN, USA, TNT and others.
In 2009, he jumped to yet another mass media branch, joining Big Radio in Monroe in the advertising and marketing department.