Even decades into retirement he would wander into the office with a tip about a business being sold or phone to say so and so had died.

That sense never diminished with age. It’s something they can’t teach at university or those in-house training courses Fairfax puts us through.

When Ray Leeson died on Friday the “old fashioned editor” did as well.

The buck stopped with him.

He advocated for the community and stood up to the knockers in his own gentlemanly but steely way.

He didn’t need management 101 to help him to deal with his critics or unruly staff.

There was no Google for him to immediately access research material.

Backstories and photos were stored in envelopes or wooden cabinets, not an online database.

He worked in the era of typewriters not Twitter.

Facebook wasn’t even a figment.

It was face to face communication, the way it was meant to be.

The Leeson era will never be replicated.

But his legacy will be enduring, for he instilled in many, if not all, of the journalists he mentored, a sense of news and community.

Today, the city he dearly loved and championed tirelessly for, will farewell him at St Saviour’s Cathedral.

We’re sure you’ll boost the circulation of the Heaven Herald, Ray.