He used news from wire services and short-wave radio transmissions, sprinkled with local tidbits about base doings. After the war, Walter returned to New York newspaper and printing work, and in the 1950s, Walter, wife Natalie and daughters Peggy and Liz began spending summers at the home of Natalie's parents, the Barretts, on Cartwright Road.

Walter fell in love with Shelter Island, and in 1956 he launched a weekly two-pager called The Bargain Hunter, grateful for two committed advertisers, South Ferry and Evans Griffing Insurance. The last attempt at a weekly paper, in 1893, was named the Shelter Island Tribune; it lasted less than a year. But the Bargain Hunter thrived, selling “For Sale” ads for 10 cents a word. Peggy remembers: “Dad laid out the advertisements (including some display ads) in his spare time at home in Westchester, had the finished product printed in New York City; we loaded it and us in the station wagon on Friday afternoons and headed to Shelter Island … The next morning my mother and I would attach the mailing labels and it was off to the post office. As acceptance of the Bargain Hunter grew, Dad added some news items, and the Bargain Hunter morphed into the Shelter Island Reporter.”

Walter often said how grateful he was that Donald Clark and Jake Piccozzi committed themselves to taking weekly ads in the Reporter, enabling him to cover printing costs for the four-page newspaper that  he launched on June 20, 1959, selling it for 10 cents a copy and $3 for a yearly subscription. Joining Piccozzi's as advertisers were Jack's Marine, the Chequit and Coecles Harbor Marina — all of which still advertise regularly in the Reporter.

During those early years of publication, Walter's daughter Peggy remembered: “Dad had a typewriter in the basement of our apartment building and there he would work late into the night to write the news stories.” Walter continued to have the Reporter printed in New York, loading his tan station wagon for the weekend trip to Shelter Island, and hand-delivering copies around town. He wrote “99 percent of the paper,” Peggy said,  “few outside columns in those days.”

When the Schumanns moved to Shelter Island full time in the 1960s, they rented one of Dan Dickerson's houses on Menantic Road, and Walter turned the garage into his office, hiring Katherine Dickerson Springer as his assistant.

One popular feature, often the first page a reader would turn to, was the column Walter initiated titled “Overheard in an Osprey's Nest, by Ima Byrd.”  Natalie, who had been born on Shelter Island, would stand over his shoulder as he typed that column and say: “You can't say that; she's so-and-so's cousin.” Nevertheless, discerning readers could often tell who he was talking about.

Natalie Schumann served for several years as personal secretary to A&P heiress Rachel Carpenter, and the Schumanns became close friends with her. Often, because of a word or two passed on to Mrs. Carpenter from Walter, Natalie, or another regular like Gracie Silvani during the noontime pool table games at Mostly Hall, an “anonymous” donation would be made to a person or cause in need on the Island.

But Walter brought serious coverage — and a glaring spotlight — to town government. He advocated clean groundwater, tighter zoning controls, conservation and preservation of the Island's priceless heritage. He especially fought for open meetings of Town Boards, and the right of the public to know what went on. At one point, the Town Board threatened to publish its legal notices in another newspaper, but Walter's editorials continued unabated, and the legals continued to be published in the Reporter.

In 1973, with signs that his diabetes and related health problems were worsening, Walter sold the Reporter to Barbara and Bob Dunne, with two major provisions: first, that the masthead would have a line in small type that said: “Founded in 1959 by Natalie and Walter Schumann.” Sadly, that line has disappeared, much to the dismay of Walter's family.

The second provision was that Walter retained the mortgage for the paper's sale, and that if the Dunnes missed even one issue in 52 weeks, he would again own the paper. When he periodically showed up at the Reporter to see how things were going, it frightened Barbara Dunne to death, she later told me. Walter's doctor urged Natalie to go ahead and accede to Walter's dream of traveling in his beloved mobile home to Florida “while Walter could still travel”; but soon after they arrived, Natalie suffered a massive and fatal stroke.

Walter returned to the Island, and started writing a column for the Reporter titled “Ear to the Ground,” following the Native American image of  bending to the ground to listen for hooves or wagon wheels, to learn what was going on ­— a talent at which Walter excelled. But when Barbara Dunne dared to edit Walter's copy, he moved his column to the Suffolk Times at the invitation of publisher Troy Gustavson.

A column that appeared in the August 10, 1989 edition could have been written yesterday: “It must also be recognized that the Island's bucolic days have passed into history. Complaints about noise are becoming too frequent to ignore. We need to control noise instead of merely talking about it. And while we're about it, let's also hang a penalty on burglar alarms that cry wolf.”

In 1985, when Bob Dunne died, Barbara Dunne decided to sell the Reporter, and Walter helped develop numbers for a viable local bid ­— all cash. Troy Gustavson, current owner of the Reporter, also put in a bid at the time. But Ms. Dunne held on to the Reporter for several more years, eventually selling to Gardner “Pat” Cowles, owner of the Sag Harbor Express in 1989. Ten years later, the Reporter joined Mr. Gustavson's Times/Review Newspapers family.

By the mid 1980s, Walter had married Caroline Mottram Johntra and moved into her house on Dinah Rock Road; the Schumanns became cherished neighbors for the rest of their lives. In 1991, with Walter's health and especially his eyesight failing, the Schumanns searched the nation for a good retirement community with assisted living facilities; the best one they found was in Wilmington, North Carolina. As they prepared to leave the Island, a farewell dinner was held in their honor at St. Mary's Church. The Reverend Peter MacLean presented Walter with a plaque designed by Reporter editor Art Barnett, which read: “To Walter Schumann, in appreciation for telling the truth to Shelter Island.”

Walter displayed and cherished that plaque for the rest of his life, which ended June 4, 1999 — just short of the 40th anniversary of his founding of the Reporter. Walter's funeral service was held on a Thursday, June 10, 1999, the day his obituary was published in the Reporter, and, sadly, many Islanders read about the service after the fact. But as friends and family laid Walter to rest in Emily French Cemetery that afternoon, he carried more secrets to his grave than he ever published in the “Osprey's Nest.” And he is missed to this day.

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