Data from Oklahoma
Newspapers When a man started a newspaper he was usually owner, editor and publisher.
Many difficulties beset him. A heavy rain would cause the
creeks to rise so the
stage could not bring the print
paper when it was expected. Repairs on the press
were days
away from the office and the subscription list was small, though
almost everyone sent the paper "back home." An "ad" three
columns square cost
three to five dollars. "It was rare to
have the advertising reach fifty dollars
a month." A
newspaper made a meager living for its editor and it is not
surprising that the South and West advertised for
"a few loads of chips"
as payments on subscriptions and
the Beaver County Democrat (1893)
offered the
paper in exchange for feed, chickens, eggs or butter. The newspapers of the Oklahoma Panhandle fall into three groups: (1) Early: (a) No Man's Land and (b) Beaver County to 1900. Four newspapers were established in No Man's Land, the Beaver City
Pioneer (1886), the Territorial Advocate
(1887), the Benton County
Banner (1889), and the Hardesty
Times (1889). The following can be listed as
early papers,
also; the Beaver County Democrat (1892), South and West
(1894), and the Cimarron News (1898). On June 19, 1886, the Beaver City Pioneer was launched at "Beaver,
Neutral Strip," by E. E. Henley, who published the Fowler
Graphic at
Fowler,
Kansas, a town about thirty miles
north of
Beaver City. The mechanical work on the Pioneer was done there.
In the first issue Mr. Henley challenged the townspeople
to support the paper
for he had started it because he
thought the town needed it.
(2) Rock
Island towns, 1900-1907.
(3) Oklahoma. Cimarron, Texas,
and Beaver Counties,
1907.
(1) Early Newspapers—No
Man's Land.
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