By Isaac Donsky
Baltimore Watchdog Staff Writer
By day, Eric Saul works as a self-employed architect, designing homes in the city of Takoma Park. As he works, he jots down ideas in a notepad.
The ideas aren’t about the building he is designing. His notepad is filled with jokes for his other job.
Saul is the founder and main writer for the Takoma Torch, a satirical news website based in Takoma Park. Since Feb. 22, 2019, Saul has posted his witty observations on Takoma Park politics, community events, and national news.
“We’re not fake news,” says Saul, principal owner of Saul Architects. “We’re satire. We help people change by helping them to laugh at their own ridiculousness.”
Saul, who graduated from Notre Dame in 2002 with a bachelor’s degree in architecture, founded the Torch after watching several community meetings struggle with the question of whether to turn a parking lot into a development. The meetings had become comical, he says.
“It was honestly ridiculous,” Saul says. “Three years of fighting over something so trivial as a parking lot. I was finding myself angry, and I wanted to channel that anger into something.”
Thus, the Torch was born. Using the comedic style of John Stewart and Stephen Colbert as inspiration, Saul went to work writing the first article. The piece claimed that Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon and owner of The Washington Post, had entered the bidding for the parking lot.
Saul was surprised by the response to the article.
“People around Takoma Park were asking who had written the piece,” Saul says.
Today, the Torch is popular in the Takoma Park area, which is the largest city in Montgomery County and a suburb of Washington, D.C. Many local government leaders have responded positively to the Torch, including Takoma Park City Council member Cindy Dyballa and Mayor Kate Stewart.
“I very much appreciate the Torch,” Stewart says. “Given these incredibly stressful times, it is important to take the time to laugh and take a break. The Torch provides an opportunity to do that.”
Only four employees write for the Torch. None write full time.
“All of us have jobs outside of the Torch,” Saul says. “We write when we can and are not super active all the time.”
Mike Hoverter writes for the Torch in his spare time. A friend of Saul’s, he has provided material for the Torch since its inception.
“Eric and I will work on stories and jokes while working out,” Hoverter says. “We share our different humor styles and different ways of writing, which allows us to boil down our jokes to the essence.”
Hoverter says the Torch is a stress-reliever. His full-time job is with CRDF Global, a non-profit that does international development in the science sector.
“I see humor on both the national and international stage,” Hoverter says. “I do a lot of technical writing for my company, so writing comes easy to me. My strength is to go back and finesse something someone wrote.”
The writing process for the Torch is very laid back, with only two articles published every week. Saul says ideas come while he is working on his architecture projects.
“I’ll take breaks while I’m working to check social media and the news,” Saul says. “When an idea comes to me, I’ll jot it down in my notepad.”
Saul admits that when he started, he was not the world’s greatest writer. However, writing for the Torch has strengthened his writing style.
“The best stories are the ones where I’m laughing as I write them down,” Saul says. “For example, I was working on a story about Takoma Park buying Greenland while on the way to the airport, and I couldn’t stop laughing.”
From Takoma Park councilmembers to Major League Baseball teams, nobody is safe from the Torch’s jabs. But the news website does have one golden rule that Saul is proud they have never broken.
“We never punch down,” Saul says. “We don’t pick on marginalized groups. Our target is wealthy white liberals in Takoma Park. We punch up and don’t take the low blows.”
Having published more than 200 articles, the Torch has already garnered a major following that is worldwide in appeal, with at least one reader from 190 countries, according to the websites data.
“It’s incredible to think that people worldwide have checked out our site,” Saul says. “I never imagined we would get this far.”