Past, Size, Content, Reliable, Educational, Humor…ect. What happen to the news paper? Here I go dating myself, I remember a time here in Baltimore there were two daily newspapers, each having a Morning and Evening edition: “The News American” and “The Baltimore Sun”. The one that I enjoyed the most was “The News American” for the reason is; clearly, because it was the one my parents had delivered, by my older brother. You see back then they hired “paperboys” to make the deliveries, and my brother would collect his papers to distribute them through the neighborhoods. If I wasn’t busy, I would help. The daily papers of yesteryear were as big as today’s Sunday papers. Today’s Sunday paper is about the size of the daily paper as I remember, or smaller. It came to the realization for my brother to carry these papers; I went out and built a go-cart for him. It was more for fun to ride the go-cart in “Patterson Park” and go down “Cannonball Hill”; as we called it.
.
.
 |
| Patterson Park "Cannonball Hill" |
Back then the pages were full of information about the city and the nation. They gave you insight in about every aspect of sports, from baseball, football and even fishing and more. It wasn’t just the major sports; it also included the high schools. There was; of course, the political spins included whenever there was an event or needing to highlight their endorsement. “Everything changes but Everything Stays the Same”. Each paper had sections divided amongst them, for the most part the day of the week would have a special section. Some of the daily ones where: Local News, Sports, Nation, Classified and I think I missed one or two. Some of the special sections included: Arts and Entertainment, Real Estate, Travel and a Kids section. The one part I missed the most was “The Funnies” (comics); it took up two full pages and included the Horoscopes and a puzzles (crossword, word search).
I believe the problem with the news papers is the lack of good writing, non-in-depth writing, and in part bias. It could also be said that it is late with the news. The entire paper is probably made up of 2/3 ads to make up the revenue lost from readership. The readers of today count on the “internet” for current and up-to-date news. They can find more articles on one story in the matter of milliseconds. Yes they get bombarded with the ads but tend to ignore them just as I do. Best of all I get my “Funnies” fix online.
Thanks to Google for the pics.
Wikipedia
The Baltimore News-American was formed by a merger of two papers, the Baltimore News-Post and the Baltimore American, in 1964. However, these papers themselves had a long history that preceded them, in particular the Baltimore American which could trace its lineage unbroken to at least 1796. Other precursor papers Baltimore News and Baltimore Post were founded in 1873 and 1922, respectively.William Randolph Hearst's Hearst Company newspaper empire acquired the morning American and afternoon News in 1923 from Frank Munsey (who also owned the New York Herald, New York Sun, and New York Telegraph). The Scripps-Howard Post was later acquired and merged with the News in 1936 to create the Baltimore News-Post. In 1964 the News-Post and American became the News-American. After the paper's last edition was published on May 27, 1986, its demise left The Baltimore Sun as the sole broad-circulation daily in Baltimore.
The Baltimore Sun is the U.S. state of Maryland’s largest general circulation daily newspaper and provides coverage of local and regional news, events, issues, people, and industries.[2] The Sun was founded on May 17, 1837, by printer Arunah Shepherdson Abell and two associates. The Abell family owned the paper through 1910, when the Black family gained a controlling interest. The paper was sold in 1986 to the Times-Mirror Company of Los Angeles. The same week, the rival Baltimore News American, owned by the Hearst Corporation, announced it would fold. The Sun, like most legacy newspapers in the United States, has suffered a number of setbacks of late, including a decline in readership, a shrinking newsroom,[3] and competition from a new free daily, The Baltimore Examiner, which has since folded.[4] In 2000, the Times-Mirror company was purchased by the Tribune Company, of Chicago.
On September 19, 2005, and again on August 24, 2008, The Baltimore Sun introduced new layout designs.[5] Its circulation as of 2010 was 201,830 for the daily edition and 344,118 on Sundays. On April 29, 2009, the Tribune Company announced that it would lay off 61 of the 205 staff members in the Sun newsroom.[1]
The Baltimore Sun is part of the Baltimore Sun Media Group, which also produces the b free daily newspaper and more than 30 other Baltimore metropolitan-area community newspapers, magazines and Web sites. BSMG content reaches more than 1 million Baltimore-area readers each week and is the region's most widely read source of news.
I agree that a majority of the paper consists of ads and personally that is annoying. Yeah, we deal with that on the internet, but I feel like there are a lot of article on the same piece of news with different points of view. But in the paper, you only get the writers bias opinion on a certain topic.
ReplyDeleteBoy that takes me back, I remember the News American, the paperboys (my brother was one for the Dundalk Eagle), and yes those papers were large. I didn't read them much and still don't except for The Dundalk Eagle. Can you get coupons online for you groceries and will the store accept them?
ReplyDeletei like how you talk about the newspaper being a part in your actual everyday life. it makes it feel alot more personal, because even though it was a long time ago, i never used them at all. unless its the table cloth for some crabs lol
ReplyDeleteMy Dad was a paperboy for the News American as well. Your point about the shrinking size of newspapers is very interesting especially when you consider how many advertisements are included these days, people feel like they are getting ripped off.
ReplyDeleteThe only part that
ReplyDeleteI look at of the Newspaper is the ads !!!!I am a shopoholic though lol
Think about all the journalists who lost their jobs as a result of the beautiful thing that we call technology. You know who delivers my papers? Some dude driving in a van. He drives by and throws the paper in my yard. The crazy part is that I haven't paid for a subscription in years, and I even went so far as to call the paper and ask them to stop delivering me their paper. I liked your blast from the past perspective.
ReplyDeleteYour right on the size of the newspaper is decreasing.. I like how you explained how the amount of information in a newspaper of it is late as "news" to get to people.. I feel strong about how that could be hurting its business!
ReplyDelete