1736-1765: The Colonial Period
1766-1779: The Revolutionary Era
1780-1929: The Dormant Period
1930-2002: Modern Times
1736-1765: The Colonial Period
If there is nothing as fragile as news, the fragility
of newspapers themselves runs a close second. Hundreds of
newspapers have begun with great ambition, only to merge with
others or fold from bankruptcy.
With that knowledge, William Parks might be the most astonished
person of all to learn that his Virginia Gazette survives intact
nearly 270 years after he published the first four-page edition on
Aug. 6, 1736.
The Gazette encountered its own hard times and ceased publication
several times, notably during the 1800s, and the number of years of
publication totals closer to 210. But in 1986 the Gazette marked
its 250th birthday as the oldest newspaper in America
published on a non-daily basis. Until it expanded to twice-a-week
publication in June 1984, the moniker was simpler: America’s
oldest weekly.
Newspapers were a long time coming to colonial Virginia. English
law precluded any printing by the colonists for years after
Jamestown was founded in 1607. The royal governors did not allow
any printing until 1690, and even then printers were governed by
royal instructions which required a license and the governor’s
permission.
One of those governors, Sir William Berkeley, put it bluntly. “I
thank God, there are no free schools nor printing, and I hope we
shall not have these hundred years; for learning has brought
disobedience, and heresy, and sects into the world, and printing
has divulged them, and libels against the best government. God keep
us from both.”
An enterprising fellow tried anyway.
In 1682, a printer named William Nuthead arrived at Jamestown, then
the capital. He set up his press and began to publish the acts of
the recently adjourned Assembly. He also printed several other
papers about which nothing is known.
Nuthead was called before the governor and the council, where he
was ordered to stop the presses “until the signification of his
Majesties pleasure shall be known therein.” Within months that
“pleasure” was known when a royal order was issued that “no person
be permitted to use any press for printing upon any occasion
whatsoever.”
With that definitive ruling, Nuthead packed up and returned to his
native Maryland. Printing was nonexistent in the colony for nearly
50 years thereafter.
Government policy eventually eased and a more tolerant attitude
prevailed. In 1730 William Parks moved from Annapolis to
Virginia’s new capital, Williamsburg, to open a branch office.
Parks had only three years earlier founded Maryland’s first
newspaper, The Maryland Gazette.
Parks was an eminent printer. Before arriving in Maryland he
operated printing shops in three locations of his native England
– Ludlow, Hereford and Reading.
An accomplished printer of job work and newspapers, it is a wonder
that Parks waited six years before publishing his first Virginia
Gazette. Perhaps like virtually every other colonial printer he
wanted to build a base of printing operations on which to found the
paper.
It’s possible the trial of John Peter Zenger in 1735 had an
influence on Parks. Zenger was the publisher of the New York Weekly
Journal who was charted with seditious libel for his disrespect in
print of the Crown. A jury freed Zenger and “There were huzzahs in
the hall,” according to one report.
If Parks was struck by Zenger’s zeal, he did not reflect it
in print. His own sheet was devoid of outright political criticism,
and journalism historian Edwin Emery does not list Parks among the
top ten leaders of the pre-Revolutionary press.
Nonetheless, Parks had an effect on Williamsburg. Right from the
start his Gazette had the professional touch of a master craftsman.
The earliest edition in existence, No. 6, is full of accounts from
England, including news of the ministry, unrest in Persia, and this
juicy crime item:
“We have an Account from Bristol, that last Wednesday Morning, one
Mrs. Norman, who kept a Huckster Shop on St. Phillip’s Plain
there, was found murdered in her own Shop, in a very dismall
manner, she having several Marks of Violence about her Head, which,
in all probability was the Cause of her Death, of of which a large
Quantity of Blood issued.”
News in the Gazette was taken largely from letters written abroad
and recently arrived in the hands of the printer himself or
friendly readers. Information was also taken from English papers
and other colonial sheets.
There was not much local news in Parks’ Gazette. What little
there was appeared primarily in advertisements of recent ship
arrivals, shops opening, runaway slaves, deserted spouses, and
strayed horses.
By today’s standards The Virginia Gazette of 1736 would look
gray and ponderous. There were no headlines, no photographs, no
fancy page makeup. But there was news, and for a town that never
had a newspaper before it was welcome.
It was also well produced. The writing was clear and to the point,
though modern readers may find it difficult to plod through the
long “s” formation that resemble an “f.”
There were few typographical errors, which is a statement any
newspaper then or now would like to make. But it was even more
difficult in the 1700s. There were six variations of the “s”
ligature, and most nouns were upper-cased regardless of whether
they were proper nouns.
Advertising was crucial to The Virginia Gazette. Parks ran an
“Advertisement, concerning Advertisements” on Oct. 8, 1736, which
concluded with this promotion:
“And as these Papers will circulate (as speedily as possible) not
only all over This, but also the Neighboring Colonies, and will
probably be read by some Thousands of People, it is very likely
that may have the desir’d Effect; and it is certainly the
cheapest and most effectual Method that can be taken for publishing
any Thing of this Nature.” The same holds true today.
A typical day for William Parks had him working ten hours, perhaps
more if he was printing his weekly Gazette on his sheet-fed
handpress. It was a laborious process of setting the type by hand,
picking letter by letter from a box of matrices.
Once the type was set it was locked into place in a metal form.
The type was inked and paper was laid across. The form was rolled
into the press, where the pressman “pulled” an impression by
yanking with both arms the big handle of the press. This pressure
forced the press to screw down on the paper and imprint the type on
the paper sheet. Around 200 sheets an hour were printed this way,
then hung to let the ink dry.
Hours were dictated largely by daylight, although some type was
composed by candlelight. This led to errors and an occasional
mishap in which trays of painstakingly set type were “pied” or
spilled.
Colonial printers were hampered by a scarcity of type that slowed
the printing of books because only a few pages could be set at a
time before the letters were reused.
Weather frustrated many a printer, Parks included. Winter cold
slowed the mails on which the Gazette was so dependent for news.
When no dispatches arrived, Parks would offer that as an excuse for
printing a shorter sheet. Spring and fall were the busy time during
which the General Court convened in Williamsburg. Summer and winter
were comparatively dull, and this is reflected in the Gazettes of
the period.
Censorship also posed problems, and from three sectors: the
English government, local authorities, and an offended public.
The last major problem faced by colonial printers was a shortage
of paper. This was handmade stuff, consisting of ground-up rags. It
was tough and durable but varied in quality.
During 1736-1744 Parks imported his paper from Pennsylvania,
except for finer stock shipped from England for publishing books
and other more permanent pieces.
In 1743 at the urging of Benjamin Franklin, Parks set about
building his own paper mill in Williamsburg. Over the next four
years Franklin sold Parks 11,382 pounds of rags. Appeals were often
printed asking readers to save their old clothes for paper-making
purposes. Old shirts, caps, dresses, handkerchiefs and gowns were
brought and subsequently returned to the reader in a different
form.
Park’s watermark, with the distinctive “WP” and crown, was
later recovered during the restoration of Williamsburg. It remains
perfectly intact more than 200 years later, despite the intricacy
of the watermark’s fragile wires.
By 1776 the paper mill in Williamsburg had apparently ceased
operations, and printing paper was being imported from Philadelphia
by water. It was risky and uncertain, since colonial ships were
fair game for British men-of-war.
In early 1750 Parks sailed for England on a business trip. During
the voyage he was seized with a fatal attack of pleurisy and was
buried at journey’s end in Gosport, England.
The stature of William Parks in journalism history can be measured
in part by the number of “firsts” to his credit:
- First newspaper in Maryland.
- First public printer in Virginia.
- First newspaper in Virginia.
- First publications of literary works in Virginia.
- First paper mill south of Pennsylvania.
- First postmaster of Virginia.
Add to this his diversity, energy and penchant for excellence, and
one realizes what a giant Parks was in pre-Revolutionary times.
Lawrence Wroth described it best. “The establishment of four
pioneer newspapers in as many towns, the publication of the
collected laws of two American colonies, the fostering of literary
tradition in these colonies by his encouragement of native writers
are projects that speak clearly of unusual enterprise in one who
after all was a provincial printer, or as we should describe him
nowadays, a country printer.”
1766-1779: The Revolutionary Era
If there ever was a heyday for newspapers in Virginia and
Williamsburg, it was during the Revolution. Albeit partisan, The
Virginia Gazette and other colonial newspapers reported well the
news of the growing unrest between the Crown and the colonies.
Fully 10 years before the Declaration of Independence, there
appeared carefully worded accounts. The repeal of the Stamp Act in
March 1776 brought great rejoicing to the colonies and was covered
locally in The Virginia Gazette on June 20, 1776.
“On Friday last, a good deal of Company being in Town at the Oyer
and Terminer Court, our Gratitude and Thankfulness upon the joyful
Occasion of the Repeal of the Stamp Act and the universal Pleasure
and Satisfaction it gives that all Differences between the Mother
Country and her Colonies are so happily terminated, was manifested
here by general illuminations…”
Following the death of William Parks in 1750, his associate in
business, William Hunter, bought the printing shop and with it the
Gazette. Hunter went on to distinguish himself in the tradition of
William Parks.
He served jointly with Benjamin Franklin as deputy postmaster
general for all the colonies. He also printed in 1754 the first
published writings of George Washington, “The Journal of Major
George Washington,” who at the time was 22 years old.
Hunter was the brother-in-law of John Holt, noted printer of
Connecticut and New York in Revolutionary times. Hunter died in
1761 and was succeeded by another brother-in-law, Joseph Royle.
Hunter’s will stipulated that Royle manage the business for
himself and Hunter’s infant son, William Hunter Jr.
Already things were heating up politically and competitively. A
loyalist clergyman, the Rev. John Camm, could not get his pamphlet
printed because the printer, Royle, objected to its “Satyrical
Touches upon the Late Assembly.”
Yet when Col Richard Bland set out to reply to Camm’s
pamphlet, Royle was a willing printer.
This selective suppression of views went badly for Royle. There
grew a controversy between him and The Maryland Gazette over
accusations that Royle refused to print attacks on the local
government.
At the urging of Thomas Jefferson and others, William Rind moved
from Annapolis in 1766 to set up a rival Virginia Gazette.
Jefferson recalled years later that “we had but one press, and that
having the whole business of the government, and no competitor for
public favor, nothing disagreeable to the governor could be got
into it. We procured Rind to come from Maryland to publish a free
paper.”
Royle died shortly before Rind came to Williamsburg, and it turned
out to be a fortuitous death for the new fellow. Rind was elected
public printer by the House of Burgesses, giving him an economic
foothold in the form of printing documents and laws. As it turned
out, the Assembly three years later spread the wealth to both
Gazettes when it ordered them to print a large volume of the Acts
of Assembly then in force.
Alexander Purdie succeeded Joseph Royle as publisher of the
original Virginia Gazette. In 1767, Purdie took into the business
John Dixon, who by marriage was related to Royle’s widow.
Purdie, dissatisfied with the partnership, withdrew to set up his
own Virginia Gazette. The first issue appeared Feb. 3, 1775.
If the reader is confused, imagine how confused Williamsburg
readers were 200 years ago. By early 1775 there were three separate
Virginia Gazettes, all operating in town and all under the same
name.
There was Dixon’s Gazette (the original), Rind’s Gazette
and Purdie’s Gazette (the newest).
They all carried pretty much the same news in largely the same
format, four to eight pages weekly. The easiest way to tell them
apart was by their mottos. The original Gazette was known to be
“Containing the freshest Advices, Foreign an Domestick.”
Rind’s Gazette promised it was “Open to all Parties but
Influenced by None.” Purdie’s declared “Always for Liberty and
the Publick Good.”
Nor were these three the only Virginia Gazettes. By 1809 a total
of 24 papers in the state had used the term Virginia Gazette in
their flags.
The reason is simple.
“Gazette” in Britain specified “official record” and lent real
authority to any periodical with that name. In the colonies, the
Assemblies ordered their resolutions and proclamations printed “in
the Gazette” or “in The Virginia Gazette” for public attention and
consumption.
But it was not specified which Gazette was to get the business,
leaving it up for grabs in Williamsburg among three papers. A
printer calling his paper, say, The Williamsburg Bugle, was
automatically eliminating himself from any government income.
Dixon did not run the original Gazette alone when Purdie left.
Dixon went immediately into partnership with William Hunter Jr.,
son of the late printer. Together they continued their Gazette
until the end of 1778. Early in 1779 Hunter joined the British
forces and left Williamsburg.
Dixon then entered into partnership with Thomas Nicolson and
revived the Gazette in February 1779, but it was not to last for
long – at least not in Williamsburg. When the capital was
moved from Williamsburg to Richmond in 1780, the printers
followed.
Rind’s paper was taken over upon his death in 1773 by his
wife, Clementina. She thus became the first woman printer and
editor in Virginia, and is credited by at least one historian as
one of the 10 pioneer women journalists in America.
By 1775 John Pinkney took over as manager and then in 1776 as
owner of Mrs. Rind’s shop and paper, but he moved to North
Carolina early in 1777 and died in August that year. This marked
the end of the second Virginia Gazette.
The third Gazette operated by Alexander Purdie continued after his
death in 1779. His nephew, John Clarckson, and one of his printers,
Augustine Davis, ran it until the end of 1780 when it ceased
operations because the capital had moved.
Printers’ fortunes – indeed everyone’s – rose
and fell with the legislature. As the Revolution intensified, so
did government action, and in the brief 14-year span of 1766-1780
three Virginia Gazettes prospered, only to vanish when the General
Assembly packed up and left.
The Gazettes of the 1770s contain a myriad of fascinating details
about the Revolution, and about life itself. Ever since 1930 when
it was revived, the modern Virginia Gazette has run a weekly column
of extracts from these papers, usually 200 years ago to the month.
The extracts ran on page 1 for years but now run on the Diversions
page.
An essay in the Gazette of June 2, 1774, had this to say about the
“Rise and Utility of Newspapers”:
“Politicks are now little more than a Farce; The Rage of Party
has, in great Measure, subdued, and Peace having fixed her Standard
among us, we are no longer troubled with long accounts of Battles
between contending Armies. Our Newspapers are now devoted to a more
agreeable Purpose: They yield us a more amusing Variety of Matter,
as they are either employed n the politer Services of Literature,
or in establishing more extensive Connexions amongst Mankind.”
Historian William P. Black said, “What is particularly important
about the years of Alexander Purdie’s editorship is not simply
that he provided a free forum for local writers, but that the very
freedom of his press prompted Virginians to speak openly on native
subjects.”
Often when readers wanted to be free to write scathing criticism
of policies and people, they signed their remarks with pseudonyms
such as “Nonestus,” “Phili Meritus” or “Dikephylos.”
Sometimes it didn’t work, as in the case of a Virginia
clergyman who attempted to praise himself using a pseudonym. He
sent in a wedding announcement which described the sermon preached
by the Rev. Mr. Dunlop as given in a “New and striking Manner.”
Three weeks later, the paper carried “A consolatory Epistle of the
Reverend Mr. D_______P, Upon the Unlucky Discovery His Being the
Author of His Own Panegyrick.”
The Gazettes published much poetry, often satirizing or defending
people. One writer, disgusted with the satirical verse, wrote one
of his own, calling their writings the “Bully’s art,” and
comparing their poetry to the screeching of an owl.
Satire turned against satirists was not uncommon, either. When
debates dragged to excessive length, readers often responded with
angry threats of canceled subscriptions.
More predominant was the long heavy prose on the state of the
colonies or the world in general.
Native humor was found sparingly in the Gazettes. “Hasty Pudding,
a Cure for the Quinsy,” ostensibly informed the public of a new
cure. Actually it was a farce recounting a tale of a doctor
ordering two large bowls of hasty pudding for a patient suffering
from an inflamed throat. A slight spill from one of the bowls
resulted in a pudding fight, and the ensuing laughter cured the
patient of his quinsy.
Minority views were also printed, as in the case of a grouchy
character reflecting on “the Absurdity of various fashionable
Customs.”
“It is my Misfortune to visit some Houses where six Children dine
at the Table, and Mamma, to show her good Breeding and Manners, has
taught all her squeaking Brats to drink to every Person’s
Health at the Table and therefore, we have nothing in our Ears but
the dull Repetitions of these Children, to show their Observance of
their Mamma’s Dictates.”
Purdie’s Gazette, from which all these items have been
extracted, continued to be a sparkling newspaper after it was
formed anew in 1775 and Dixon was left with the original
Gazette.
Perhaps because Dixon’s new partner, William Hunter Jr., was
a loyalist, the original Gazette dragged its feet on covering the
Revolution. In any event, Purdie continually scooped the other two
Gazettes.
On Feb. 2, 1776, Purdie printed excerpts from Tom Paine’s
pamphlet, “Common Sense,” the famous statement of arguments for
independence. John Pinkney ran it the next day in his Virginia
Gazette.
Purdie also beat the competition on breaking the Declaration of
Independence. He published a brief reference to it by way of the
postmaster in Fredericksburg on July 12, just 10 days after
Congress resolved that the united colonies were free and
independent states. (It wasn’t declared until July 4.)
The following Friday, July 19, Purdie ran key passages from the
Declaration, promising to print the entire document next week.
Dixon and Hunter followed suit and the two Gazettes ware thought to
be the first papers outside Philadelphia to print the Declaration
verbatim.
What’s curious is how the two Gazettes played it up – or
down. Purdie ran it as lead story on Page 1, which it consumed
entirely before concluding atop page 2. There were also reports on
the proclamation of the Declaration in Trenton, New York and
Williamsburg.
Dixon and Hunter, on the other hand, ran the Declaration on Page
2, reserving Page 1 for lesser accounts about shipping, naval
matters and a death. (Pinkney’s Gazette didn’t run it at
all – it had folded the previous February.)
No one knew during these troubled times what the outcome of the
Revolution would be. But the Gazettes and the other 34 colonial
newspapers reported the excesses of the British government and the
steps taken by the colonists to guarantee their own freedoms.
More than the political pamphlet and more than the sermons by
political clergy, the colonial newspaper contributed the most to
the propaganda of the Revolution. The Patriot press inspired the
colonies to rebel against tyranny, and it worked.
Nothing, not even war, had such a disastrous effect on
Williamsburg as the removal of the capitol in 1780 to Richmond. It
was done to make the seat of government more convenient to the
westerly counties of the state, including what is now Illinois and
Kentucky.
Like other merchants and lawyers and doctors, John Dixon and John
Nicolson moved their Virginia Gazette to Richmond, leaving
Williamsburg without a newspaper for the first time in 44
years.
A case can be made that the Gazette did not die out since it was
merely removed to Richmond, but the fact is Williamsburg was
without its own hometown paper.
Furthermore, the original Gazette that did continue in Richmond
was quickly dissipated by competition and an apparent disregard by
Dixon and Nicolson for their paper’s historic title and
identity.
Dixon and Nicolson published their last Gazette in Williamsburg on
April 8, 1780. The first issue in Richmond appeared May 9, 1780. It
continued until April 21, 1781, and then stopped until May 19,
which is the last issue located. In December 1781, Nicolson
established The Virginia Gazette, or Weekly Advertiser. Dixon was
no longer partner; William Prentis was.
In February 1782 they changed the “or” in the flag of the paper to
“and,” so it read The Virginia Gazette, and the Weekly Advertiser.
In 1792 the initial “The” was removed from the flag. Nicolson
continued the paper until 1797, when it apparently folded with the
issue of April 22.
It was a sudden and serious vacuum, considering that in recent
years three Virginia Gazettes were competing for readers and
advertisers. But there was no news to speak of anyway, since all
the government activity that stimulated Williamsburg had shifted 50
miles up the James.
It was many years before another newspaper was established in
Williamsburg. In 1824 Joseph Repiton set up the Phoenix Gazette and
Williamsburg Intelligencer. In 1828 the Plough-Boy was added and
the paper renamed the Phoenix Plough-Boy. Publication continued
until July 1829.
Then for the next 25 years the quiet of inactivity again settled
on Williamsburg, known as the “great decline.” During these years
no newspaper was published in the community.
In 1853 Thomas Martin re-established The Virginia Gazette. Harvey
Ewing became editor in 1854. In 1857 E.H. Lively associated with
Ewing and they continued the Gazette until June 9, 1858.
When Ewing retired R.A. Lively became associated with his brother
and continued the publication until the Civil War intervened.
Federal troops took over Williamsburg in May 1862. The Gazette
plant was seized and editor Lively, who had joined the Confederate
forces, was captured and sent to prison.
At the end of the war the press was returned to Lively in
Williamsburg. For a time he published a paper called The Weekly
Review, but in 1869 with his brother he again revived The Virginia
Gazette. It was suspended a short time later, however, in 1871.
During 1884-1887 Benjamin Long and R.T. Armistead published The
Williamsburg Gazette and James City County Advertiser. It was the
first and only time a paper carried the name Williamsburg Gazette,
though even today many mistakenly call The Virginia Gazette by that
name.
There was no paper published for another six years until in 1893
W.C. Johnson revived the Virginia Gazette. This time publication
lasted 25 years until 1918. Two years later, Record Publishing
Corp. took control and published the Gazette until 1922.
In 1926 Dr. J.A.C. Chandler, president of the College of William
and Mary, resumed publication of the Gazette, with Havilock Babcock
of the School of Journalism, as editor. The paper died out in six
months and eventually so did the journalism school.
In 1930, as work on the town’s first major restoration
undertaking, the Christopher Wren Building was nearing completion,
newspaper publisher J.A. Osborne came to Williamsburg. He came at
the request of W.A.R.
Goodwin, rector of Bruton Parish Church, who originally envisioned
the restoration of Williamsburg to its colonial appearance. It was
Dr. Goodwin’s idea that if Williamsburg was to be revived, so
too should its newspaper, The Virginia Gazette.
Osborne moved his Florida plant to Williamsburg and on Jan.10,
1930, with his son, Hugh S. Osborne, issued the first edition of
the revised Gazette under the original Williams Parks motto,
“Containing the freshest Advices, Foreign and Domestick.”
The paper has been printed every week since, including semi-weekly
the past 25 months. It is a curiosity that the two longest spans of
uninterrupted publication are at opposite extremes of the
paper’s time line: 1736-1780 and 1930-present. In 1932, Frank
L. Adolph joined his father-in-law, J.A. Osborne, in the business.
Osborne’s son, J.A. Jr., came to the paper in 1944.
From 1930 on, many members of the Osborne family worked for the
Gazette. By 1957 Alex Osborne was business-ad-job manager; Mildred
Osborne Adolph was social editor; and Marian Osborne was the new
assistant editor.
A third sister, Marguerite Osborne, was the editor. She was only
the second woman to hold the job in over 200 years, succeeding
Clementina Rind.
When the Osbornes sold the paper to John O.W. Gravely III
effective Jan. 1, 1961, an era of family control ended as the
Gazette changed hands. But Marian Osborne remained and became
business manager. She retired in October 1975 after 45 years of
service to the paper, the longest stretch by a single Gazette
employee.
In 1970 the Gazette turned from the traditional letterpress
operation for printing the paper to the more modern offset
method.
The result has been a crisper print job on finer paper with sharper
pictures as well. The Gazette also dropped its 200-year-old tabloid
form for the more practical and modern broadsheet.
In July 1972 the entire Gazette plant and offices were moved from
420 Prince George St. in mid-town to 173 Second St. on the eastern
fringe of the city. This doubled the news and production space to
6000 square feet and included a new 1400-square-foot wing for a
full-sized press capable of printing 15,000 papers an hour. A later
expansion of the press boosted its page capacity to 20 pages
broadsheet or 40 pages tabloid.
By May 1975 when Gravely died unexpectedly at the age of 47, the
Gazette had grown threefold in 15 years to 8,100 paid circulation
and had regained its position as the leading newspaper in the
Williamsburg area.
Gravely’s success with the Gazette was due entirely to his
own broad experience in newspapers. Unlike many publishers who
became specialized in news or advertising departments in their
formative years, Gravely was experienced in both sectors. He worked
for four years writing city and state news with the Richmond
Times-Dispatch in the early 1950s and then moved to advertising
sales, where he spent another four years and rose to assistant
manager of national advertising.
During the next 11 years, the Gazette staff grew to 52 full-time
employees, 29 part-timers and 17 motor route carriers.
The news staff now comprises 10 reporters and editors and 10 more
columnists and part-time reporters.
Under the late Al Eberhard and his successor as production
manager, Ralph Swartz, the Gazette modernized its typesetting, job
printing presses and camera department, and expanded into offset
production and other community and college publications.
In March 1986 William C. O’Donovan, assistant publisher and
editor, was named editor and publisher when the Gazette was sold to
Chesapeake Publishing Corp., a subsidiary of Whitney
Communications.
Swartz became general manager for printing.
During Mrs. Burgess’s tenure as publisher and president, the
Gazette took another major step when it became a twice-weekly
newspaper. Although it lost its unique distinction as
America’s oldest weekly newspaper, it celebrated a landmark in
journalism history 250 years to the day that William Parks first
published The Virginia Gazette.
In 1988, the Gazette built a 9,000-square-foot office building in
front of its printing plant on Ironbound Road. That tripled the
working space and enabled the staff to grow accordingly. The
interior was designed with plenty of open space and few walls, as
well as with windows looking out from nearly all departments.
In 1992, Chesapeake Publishing set out on a strategy of
“clustering” newspapers in Virginia, having already done so
successfully in Maryland. The Northern Neck News in Warsaw was
purchased from R. Marshall Coggin, whose family had run the paper
for 113 years. After several years, the office building was gutted
and rebuilt to modern specifications.
In 1995, Chesapeake bought five weeklies from Atlantic
Publications of the Eastern Shore:
- Northumberland Echo in Heathsville.
- Westmoreland News in Montross.>
- The Caroline Progress in Bowling
Green. - Tidewater Review in West Point.
- Sussex-Surry Dispatch in Wakefield.
By 2000, Chesapeake
had grown nearly 1,000 employees working at 55 publications and
four printing plants in five states. The Virginia division had 145
working at seven newspapers, three specialty magazines, and a
printing plant.
In 2001 Chesapeake began divesting much of the company by selling
off certain divisions to publicly traded companies. The Daily Press
Inc., a subsidiary of Tribune Co., bought the entire Virginia
division and pledged to preserve the competitive spirit of news and
advertising between the daily and the Gazette in the Williamsburg
market.
In 2002, the four papers comprising the Northern Neck group were
sold to a family with ties to the Northern Neck. Michael and Carol
Diederich of Richmond and Oak Grove joined with his parents Bill
and Mary Diederich of Incline Village, Nevada, to take over the
papers as well as the visitor publication Riverviews.
By 2002, the flagship Virginia Gazette had grown to a paid
circulation of 16,500 and running up to 100 pages a week.
Under Daily Press ownership, improvements in technology and
printing enhanced the look of the paper, including wider
application of color. Internal improvements extended throughout all
departments to improve workflow and productivity. A revamped Web
site enabled readers to get in touch with the paper more easily and
check current news and commentary.
Along the top of the walls surrounding the News and Advertising
departments, hundreds of awards over the years testify to the
Gazette’s excellence in reporting, writing, design,
photography and advertising. The paper won Virginia’s
prestigious Copeland Award for community excellence in 1969, 1980
and 1994, as well as numerous top awards for editorial
leadership.
To this day, the paper serves the Williamsburg area with the same
enthusiasm that inspired William Parks. The company has quietly
lobbied the City of Williamsburg to name a street on his behalf to
commemorate the printer who started it all.
–From a 1986 history of The Virginia Gazette by W.C.
O’Donovan, updated 2002 and transcribed by Lew Leadbeater
Member of the Williamsburg Chamber of Commerce
2002 The Virginia Gazette
