History of the New England newspaper press 6 - Media feels the weight of change

Read all about it: New Northern Daily Leader Building, 1925. The Leader became the Norths second great daily. As late as 1959, the Leader was still outselling the Sydney Morning Herald in Armidale.

To this point we have followed the growth of the newspaper press in Northern NSW, the broader New England. Over the next few columns we will follow the story across the twentieth century.

It’s a story of competition, but also cooperation. It’s a story of commercial challenge, of success. But it’s also a story of radical change and, in the end, decline and lost influence.  

At federation in 1901, even small towns had at least one newspaper, many had two or even three, By 1950, consolidation had reduced the number of papers, but they remained locally or regionally owned.

As radio came during the 1930s, the new stations were again locally or regionally owned. As TV came to the North from 1962 with the establishment of Newcastle’s NBN, local or regional ownership continued. 

This was a very different world. 

In 1959 in Armidale, for example, the Armidale Express was the main source of local news, but many Armidale people also bought the Northern Daily Leader as the premier daily in inland New England providing news from across the North. The Sydney Morning Herald had increased its market share, but was still being outsold by the Leader. 

Commercial radio coverage including news was dominated by the Tamworth based Broadcast Amalgamated controlled New England radio network (2TM, 2AD, 2VM, 2NZ and 2RE). 

Newspapers, radio and then TV had a strong local and regional focus that extended beyond news coverage into the direct promotion of community activities that might benefit economic, social, cultural and community development while also serving commercial interests. 

The media had become an integral part of community infrastructure, broadly defined. 

By 2000, local or regional ownership had shrunk to a few independents. Ownership of the newspaper press across Northern NSW was split between two competing media groups, Rural Press and APN, with the Newcastle Herald owned by Fairfax. .  

These ownership changes coincided with the rise of the use of the term masthead as substitute for newspaper and had a profound impact on newspaper performance. 

The split between APN and Rural Press ownership of the Northern Rivers papers, together with a more localized paper focus, slowed and then effectively stopped the flow of information between coast and inland and indeed to a degree within the inland. 

Newspaper concentration together with tensions between APN and Rural Press also greatly impeded the work of the Country Press Association, the industry’s main cooperative body. 

In 1902, these developments lay far ahead. In my next column, I will at what we might think of as the golden age of the New England press. 

Note to readers: This post was prepared as a column for the on-line edition of the Armidale Express. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015,  here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018, here 2019, here 2020 

History of the New England newspaper press 5 - The role of newspapers in town development and rivalries

Oh! advance, advance New England

To thy place of hope and pride, 

Resist the scorn of Sydney’s sneers,

As rocks resist the tide…

Discord and discontent prevail,

Neglect has sown the seed,

Your wants o’erlooked, demands ignored,

By Sydney’s hungry greed

Glen Innes Examiner

The many newspapers established across Northern NSW over the second half of the nineteenth century were a disparate lot. 

The relative cheapness of printing technology a weekly newspaper could be started for somewhere between £300 and £600, encouraged multiple newspapers in even small centres. 

In political terms, the papers broadly supported either the liberal or conservative political causes. Many, such as the Armidale Telegraph, were established or sponsored by political figures seeking to advance their interests or to advance particular causes, including the establishment of a new colony in Northern New South Wales. 

Then, as now, those in power were prone to channel Government advertising to the papers that supported them. 

Remains: Dorrigo railway. Fights between towns and their newspapers prevented the construction of east-west railways. When construction of a line between Guyra and Dorrigo finally began, it was halted by the Depression. 

Despite the many differences between papers, a common theme in their introductory statements was, in the words of newspaper historian Rod Kirkpatrick, the material and social advancement of town and district and the enlargement of the district’s political power. 

This made them intensely parochial, supporting their town against others in the fight for better facilities and transport, something that bedeviled attempts to gain things such as east west rail links. The Clarence fought the Richmond to the point that neither could win. 

As the drift to the city became clearer, the papers began to articulate common themes, the idea of an oppressed country, and oppressing city, themes that would lay the basis for the emergence of the Country Party and a powerful new state movement. 

One of the least recognized things in this process is the role played by town mercantile and professional interests, key advertisers in the local press.  

The growth of towns and villages across the North had seen the accumulation of wealth among groups such as storekeepers that was then reinvested in building and in town and village real estate with the hope of future profit. The results of this process survive today in our built landscape. 

As it became clear that the hopes of town development could not be realized, the town elites began to look for new development options, feeding into the changing views being expressed by the papers. 

Note to readers: This post was prepared as a column for the on-line edition of the Armidale Express. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015,  here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018, here 2019, here 2020 

History of the New England newspaper press 4 - the drift to the city begins

MOVING TO THE CITY: The growth of Sydney's population towards the end of the 19th century and the early part of the 20th century put pressure on newspapers in regional areas.This is the fourth in a series on the history of the media and especially the newspaper press in New England 

Between 1861 and 1901 the population of regional NSW grew from 261,573 to 878,475. During that same period, the number of provincial newspapers grew from 21 to 193. 

By 1900, 127 towns had at least one newspaper, 58 had two or more. 

On the New England Tablelands, no less than fourteen newspapers were established between 1856 and 1878, four in Inverell, three each in Armidale, Tenterfield and Glen Innes plus one in Uralla.  

Many of the new papers had relatively short life spans. 

The peripatetic Frank Newton first established the Grafton Herald (1864-65) before coming to Armidale to establish the Armidale Telegraph (1865-1872) and then the Inverell Dispatch and Central New England Advertiser (1873-78).  

Newton’s moves reflected local politics as well as commercial pressures. Both the Armidale and Inverell papers were established to represent squatter interests at a time when their landholdings were under threat. 

While many papers had relatively short life spans, there were also titles that we know today, including the Armidale Express (1856), Tenterfield Star (1871), Glen Innes Examiner (1874), Inverell Times (1875) and the Uralla & Walcha Times (1876). 

There is a problem here for historians who rely on local newspapers. As newspaper historian Rod Kirkpatrick remarked, history is written by the winners. 

Few copies of these early newspapers have survived. In the case of the Armidale Telegraph, for example, the only extant copies are pages of one issue found under the floor boards of an Armidale house under renovation. For most, we know about them primarily from reports in other newspapers.

This means that our views are formed by papers such as the Glen Innes Examiner where copies do survive. As we have seen with Frank Newton, the papers represented particular interests. We cannot assume that the views expressed in any one paper are in fact representative. 

Regardless of the individual biases of particular papers, they were all intensely parochial, concerned to boost the towns on which their business depended and to attract the services demanded by a growing but still sparsely spread population. 

This parochialism supported and fed into rivalry between towns, a rivalry that was played on by politicians and impeded cooperative action. Now this parochialism was to be tempered by harsh economic realities, forcing the papers to cooperate. 

Central to this was the growing dominance of Sydney. While the NSW regional population still outnumbered that of Sydney by almost two to one, Sydney’s share of the NSW population had increased from 26.24% in 1871 to 35.42% in 1901, a trend that was continuing.

Note to readers: This post was prepared as a column for the on-line edition of the Armidale Express. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015,  here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018, here 2019, here 2020 

History of the New England newspaper press 3 -the rise of newspapers as New England towns flourished

 

Historic press. This Albion Press was first used to print Henry Parkes the Empire. It was then purchased by Walter Craigie and William Hipgrave in 1856 to print their new newspaper, The Armidale Express. Donated to the Museum of Applied Arts and Science by the Armidale Newspaper Company in 1929.

This is the third in a series on the history of the media and especially the newspaper press in New England 

The second half of the Nineteenth Century was a period of town formation across Northern NSW, the broader New England. With time, the slab buildings of early European settlement were replaced by more substantial structures that still form the core of our built landscape.

The squatters, merchants and still small professional and trade classes all faced communications problems.

The squatters and their agents needed to place legal advertisements about absconding servants, debts and stolen stock.

The merchants and professionals wanted to advertise their wares in town and into the countryside beyond. They also wanted to promote their towns and villages. All groups had a need for printing such as invoices, flyers, letterhead and catalogues.

Merchants and townspeople combined to sponsor the formation of newspapers. In Armidale, for example, a public meeting was convened on 1 December 1855 to consider the best way to establish a local paper for the New England district. A fund raising committee was formed and finally raised £89 12s and 6d.

The results of the meeting were advertised in the Maitland Mercury, the Sydney Morning Herald and the Empire. Two Mercury staff members decided to accept the challenge.

Early in 1856, William Hipgrave and Walter Craigie loaded their newly acquired printing press and other kit onto a bullock dray and set out from Maitland for Armidale. It took them twenty seven days. They called their paper the Armidale Express, with the first edition appearing on 5 April 1856.

The genesis of Tamworth’s first paper, the Tamworth Examiner and General Advertiser for the Northern Districts of New South Wales, later just the Tamworth Examiner, was somewhat similar.

Action began when printer John Ambrose Gallagher wrote from Yass to a number of Tamworth business houses canvassing support for the establishment of a local newspaper. The response was positive, with business owners pledging their support and that of the townsfolk, even offering a small subsidy to help Gallagher.

Gallagher declined the subsidy but moved to Tamworth, with the first edition of the paper appearing on 13 April 1859.

The formation of the Tamworth Examiner illustrates another thread in the history of the New England media, the close relationship between newspaper formation and political interests.

In responding to Gallagher, local business interests warned him that the squatters would oppose the paper unless it supported their position. By contrast, many townspeople supported the paper because it might weaken squatter power and further Tamworth’s growth.

Note to readers:This post was prepared as a column for the on-line edition of the Armidale Express. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015,  here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018, here 2019, here 2020