A newsroom debate about the athletic ability of women led to an impromptu foot race across a parking lot and, in a way, helped set the course of Susan Rosiek’s life.
Rosiek, the longtime Observer & Eccentric editor and publisher whose career spanned four decades and whose influence before she retired in 2015 reached far beyond the newsroom, died Jan. 2. She was 74.
A March 21 memorial service is planned at the Schoolcraft College VistaTech Center in Livonia.
Rosiek had ‘presence’ in newsroom, even in early years
A graduate of Ladywood High School and Michigan State University, Rosiek joined the Observer newsroom in 1974.
“I remember the first day she walked into the cafeteria,” said Steve Barnaby, the fellow journalist who would later become Rosiek’s husband of nearly 40 years. “She had a real presence about her. Just the way she talked — you couldn’t help but notice her.”
Her initial assignment, he noted, was a job no one else wanted.
“She was the first computer operator in the newsroom,” Barnaby said. “We got a computer from the Singer Sewing Machine Company, one of those old computers that made tapes, and she typed in the reporters’ copy. Nobody else wanted anything to do with computers; we all still had manual typewriters.”
It wasn’t long, he said, before Rosiek was promoted to reporter, then editor, serving first in Garden City, then Livonia before later rising into top leadership at the paper, eventually becoming executive editor and publisher.
‘She was a leader’: Rosiek became face of community journalism
Along the way, colleagues say, Rosiek became the face of community journalism at the Observer & Eccentric.
“She was a leader and she was the heart of the O&E,” said Joanne Maliszewski, who worked as a reporter and editor for about 30 years and remained one of Rosiek’s closest friends after both left the paper. “Wherever I go, if I say ‘Sue Rosiek,’ everyone knows who she is.”
Maliszewski said Rosiek was “the milk of human kindness,” the kind of person who showed up with someone’s favorite snack or stopped by to comfort a sick friend.
Livonia Mayor Maureen Miller Brosnan called Rosiek a mentor, a friend and “a champion of integrity” and said Livonia benefited from her “decisive, game-changing leadership style.”
“As a young female just stepping into politics, I was emboldened by her role in the community and the seat she’d secured among so many male leaders,” Brosnan said. “Hers was a voice grounded in values, not afraid to speak truth to power and truly willing to engage not just in the discussion, but in the doing.”
Rosiek was also deeply involved in the communities she covered.
Over the years, she served on boards and groups like St. Mary Mercy Hospital, St. Joseph Mercy Health System, the Livonia Community Prayer Breakfast, the Livonia Family YMCA, the Canton Community Foundation and many others.
Joan Noricks, former president of the Canton Community Foundation, said Rosiek had a unique ability to connect people and organizations working toward common goals.
“She knew tons of people and she had good working relationships with people and could make really good introductions for a stronger community,” Noricks said. “It wasn’t just a job for her. She really cared about building bridges and strengthening our community.”
Parking lot race makes lasting impression
Long before she became a leader in the community, Rosiek made a lasting impression on the man she would later marry.
In the newsroom of the Livonia Observer offices, then located near the southeast corner of Schoolcraft and Levan roads, Barnaby was debating with a sports editor who said no woman could outrun a man.
Barnaby looked over at Rosiek, still a relative newcomer to the job, and asked whether she thought she could beat their co-worker in a race.
“She just kind of looked up and she said, ‘Oh yeah,’” Barnaby recalled.
Rosiek changed her shoes and headed outside.
“It wasn’t even close,” Barnaby said. “She beat the crap out of that guy, the whole length of that parking lot.”
For him, the race revealed something lasting about the woman who would become his wife.
“She didn’t brag about it,” he said. “She didn’t say, ‘I beat him.’ She didn’t say anything. She just went back to work like it was nothing. That’s who she was.”
In hindsight, he said, that quick race may have changed the course of their lives.
“That was the first time I really thought, ‘Wow, she’s really special.’”
Newsroom leader stood out with fairness, instincts
Longtime Observer & Eccentric photojournalist Bill Bresler worked alongside Rosiek for more than three decades and said she stood out for her fairness, instincts and loyalty to the people she worked with.
“Personally, she made me a better person,” Bresler said, noting he considered Rosiek not just a boss and a colleague, but a trusted friend. “No doubt she was the best editor we had. She had a good nose for news and she was persistent. And she was very fair. Whether she was dealing with people in the community or dealing with staff issues, both sides got their say.”
When layoffs began to hit the newspapers in the 2000s, Bresler said Rosiek struggled with the toll it took on the newsroom.
“She agonized over that,” he said. “It just tore her up. I know she personally went out of her way to find resources to help some of the people who were laid off.”
Brad Kadrich, who Rosiek hired in 1999 to lead the Plymouth Observer, agreed.
“I think she cried harder than the people she was laying off,” he said. “The decision did not come from her, obviously. It came from above her at the corporate level, but she was forced to implement the layoffs.”
Kadrich said Rosiek had “great news judgment” and remained deeply tuned in to the communities the paper covered, including her hometown of Plymouth.
Rosiek had a belief in community journalism
Rosiek believed deeply in local journalism and the role community newspapers played in helping people understand the issues shaping their communities, Barnaby said.
Both believed the newspaper served as a kind of gathering place, a forum where people could discuss local concerns, debate issues and celebrate community achievements.
Rosiek also helped launch programs that highlighted those community connections, including the Observer & Eccentric’s Academic All-Stars program, which recognized top students from local high schools.
“She put that together,” Barnaby said. “It became extremely popular and really important to the community.”
Longtime husband considers himself ‘luckiest guy in the world’
For years, many coworkers didn’t realize Rosiek and Barnaby were a couple.
At work, they were simply colleagues. At home, a couple.
“Susan and I never talked about work at home, and we never talked about home at work,” Barnaby said. “We did that intentionally.”
Their relationship began quietly. In 1982, they traveled together to Washington, D.C., for the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial — a trip Barnaby, a Vietnam veteran, approached with hesitation.
When he mentioned he might go, Rosiek immediately volunteered.
“She said, ‘I’ll go with you,’” he said. “That was our first date.”
The relationship that followed, Barnaby said, was filled with adventure.
Together they raised their son, Ian, now 35, and built a life of shared interests in politics, books, travel and the outdoors.
“She really loved nature,” Barnaby said. “And I did, too. That’s something that we really, really shared, in big and small ways.”
In fact, although Barnaby had once vowed he would never sleep on the ground again after returning from Vietnam, he said Rosiek eased him back into the outdoors slowly, first suggesting simple camping trips to Michigan state parks.
Eventually those trips led to backpacking through the Porcupine Mountains in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.
Standing at the overlook above Lake of the Clouds, Barnaby said the moment changed him.
“It reconnected me with nature and my emotions,” he said, his voice breaking as he described the impact of the experience. “She never said, ‘We’re going to do this because you’re screwed up.’ We just did it and we had a great time.”
In recent years, Rosiek faced serious health challenges after a rare medical emergency involving a ruptured hiatal hernia. Barnaby cared for her during the final months of her life.
“She never gave up,” he said. “I feel so fortunate because I had her in my life. I think I was the luckiest guy in the world. I know that.”
Contact reporter Laura Colvin: lcolvin@hometownlife.com
This article originally appeared on Hometownlife.com: Susan Rosiek led Observer & Eccentric. Friends, husband remember legacy
Reporting by Laura Colvin, Hometownlife.com / Hometownlife.com
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