Oct. 4—Editor's note: To celebrate National Newspaper Week, the Aiken Standard is spotlighting employees with 25 or more years of service.

DiAnn Bell, having been with the Aiken Standard since June 18, 1984, is the newspaper's longest-serving employee.

She deals on a daily basis with some of the biggest names in American business, with Walmart being possibly the most prominent.

She is the newspaper's "advertising sales assistant with major national accounts," and is also responsible for laying out the newspaper — the process also known as "dummying."

She gathers each day's ads, checks to see how much space will be needed for classified advertisements and decides how many pages will actually comprise the newspaper.

The process, she confirmed, has changed tremendously since she came on board at the newspaper. "I was actually building ads. Back in that day, we literally built the ads from scratch. We didn't have computers doing it for us."

Bell also worked in what was known as the camera room, helping convert paper into metal plates that would be placed on the press for printing. She spent a few years working in classified ads as well, including time as the classified manager.

"During that time is when they started building ads and stuff on the computer," she said. "Well, I was fascinated with that, so I wanted to go back and work and do that, which I loved, because it was amazing to see the ads on the computer and how much easier it was to build them."

Among her co-workers was Debbie Price, the major national accounts executive. Price needed an assistant and Bell got the job.

Along the way, her family grew to include three sons: Eric Proctor, Todd Proctor and Justin Bell. Grandchildren include two Bells (Jase and Scarlett) and five Proctors (Meredith, Jordan, Leighton, Grayson and Emerson).

Justin Bell's arrival, she recalled, was uniquely memorable in connection with the newspaper.

"When our first Sunday paper was built, which was Saturday, Oct. 5, 1985, I was very pregnant, and I was here, because I wanted to see that first Sunday paper come off that press, and everybody was clapping and cheering," she said. "It was wonderful. It was great. The paper came out on Sunday to everybody. On Monday morning, at 11:56 a.m., I gave birth to an eight-pound, 14-ounce baby boy."