The Birmingham News
Encyclopedia
The Birmingham News is the principal daily newspaper
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...

 for Birmingham, Alabama
Birmingham, Alabama
Birmingham is the largest city in Alabama. The city is the county seat of Jefferson County. According to the 2010 United States Census, Birmingham had a population of 212,237. The Birmingham-Hoover Metropolitan Area, in estimate by the U.S...

, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, and the largest newspaper in Alabama
Alabama
Alabama is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama ranks 30th in total land area and ranks second in the size of its inland...

. The paper is owned by Advance Publications
Advance Publications
Advance Publications, Inc., is an American media company owned by the descendants of S.I. Newhouse Sr., Donald Newhouse and S.I. Newhouse, Jr. It is named after the Staten Island Advance, the first newspaper owned by the Newhouse family...

. Advance, owned by the Newhouse family, also owns two other Alabama newspapers, the Press-Register
Press-Register
The Press-Register is a daily newspaper serving the southwest Alabama counties of Mobile and Baldwin. The newspaper is a descendant of one founded in 1813, making the Press-Register Alabama's oldest newspaper...

in Mobile and The Huntsville Times
The Huntsville Times
The Huntsville Times is the daily morning newspaper published in Huntsville, Alabama, and also serves the surrounding areas of north Alabama's Tennessee Valley region. The Times formerly operated as an afternoon paper, but moved to mornings after The Huntsville News ceased publication...

.

History

The Birmingham News was launched on March 14, 1888 by Rufus N. Rhodes
Rufus N. Rhodes
Rufus Napoleon Rhodes was the founder and managing editor of the Birmingham News from 1888 until his death....

 as The Evening News, a four-page paper with two reporters and $800 of operating capital. At the time, the city of Birmingham was only 17 years old, but was an already booming industrial city and a beacon of the "New South
New South
New South, New South Democracy or New South Creed is a phrase that has been used intermittently since the American Civil War to describe the American South, after 1877. The term "New South" is used in contrast to the Old South of the plantation system of the antebellum period.The term has been used...

" still recovering from the aftermath of the American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

 and Reconstruction. Newspapers joined with industrial tycoons, academics and real-estate speculators in relentless boosterism of the new city. Rhodes was working as editor of the Daily Herald when he found his campaign for a viaduct spanning the "Railroad Reservation" dividing Birmingham's north and south opposed by his publisher. He determined to strike out on his own and launched the News with the slogan "Great is Birmingham and The News is its Prophet!" The "News Bridge" (21st Street Viaduct) was dedicated on July 4, 1891, deemed by his paper the "grandest of all municipal achievements of great and glorious Birmingham."

The News circulation grew from 628 in 1888 to over 7000 in 1891, when it became the largest daily in Alabama and won the contract to publish the General Laws of Alabama. The name was changed from The Evening News to The Daily News and then, in 1895, The Birmingham News. The newspaper continued to grow, reaching a circulation of 17,000 in 1909.

Staunchly progressive
Progressivism
Progressivism is an umbrella term for a political ideology advocating or favoring social, political, and economic reform or changes. Progressivism is often viewed by some conservatives, constitutionalists, and libertarians to be in opposition to conservative or reactionary ideologies.The...

 in its political stance, the News supported a straight-ticket Democrat
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

 platform in election seasons and championed progressive causes such as prohibition
Prohibition
Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries during which the...

. The News led the drumbeat for the "Greater Birmingham" movement to annex suburban communities. The successful campaign caused the population of the City of Birmingham to grow from 40,000 in 1900 to 138,685 in 1910, at which time Birmingham was the third largest city in the South. That same year, Rhodes died and was succeeded by his vice-president and general manager, Victor H. Hanson (1876-1945).

Hanson, only 33 years old, was already an accomplished newspaperman, having at age 11 founded the City Item in Macon, Georgia
Macon, Georgia
Macon is a city located in central Georgia, US. Founded at the fall line of the Ocmulgee River, it is part of the Macon metropolitan area, and the county seat of Bibb County. A small portion of the city extends into Jones County. Macon is the biggest city in central Georgia...

 which he sold four years later for $2,500. Hanson helped modernize the newspaper's format, tone and operations, oversaw an increase in subscriptions from 18,000 in 1910 to 40,000 in 1914 when he boldly claimed the title of "The South's Greatest Newspaper." In direct competition with the morning Age-Herald
Birmingham Post-Herald
The Birmingham Post-Herald was a daily newspaper in Birmingham, Alabama with roots dating back to 1850, before the founding of Birmingham. The final edition was published on September 23, 2005...

, the News began a Sunday edition in 1912.

In 1917 the News moved to a new six-story Jacobean-style office building on the corner of 4th Avenue North and 22nd Street. At the time of their move, the News published this opinion: "The News is proud of its new home and believes it to be the handsomest and best equipped in the entire South. Publishers from other cities have been kind enough to say that nowhere in the land was there a more adequate, convenient and efficient newspaper plant. Many thousands of dollars have been expended with that end in view."

A year later the paper made good use of its new space by purchasing the rival Birmingham Ledger, increasing the size of its staff to 748 and its circulation to 60,000.

In 1927 the Birmingham Age-Herald was sold to Hanson, who continued publishing both papers. In 1950 Scripps-Howard, which already owned the Birmingham Post bought the Age-Herald, but entered into a joint-operating agreement that moved the new Birmingham Post-Herald
Birmingham Post-Herald
The Birmingham Post-Herald was a daily newspaper in Birmingham, Alabama with roots dating back to 1850, before the founding of Birmingham. The final edition was published on September 23, 2005...

into the Birmingham News building. The News press printed both papers and handled advertising and subscriptions sales while the editorial and reporting staffs remained independent. The agreement lasted until the Post-Herald ceased publication in September, 2005, leaving the News as Birmingham's only daily newspaper.

In 1956, the Hanson family sold the News to S.I. Newhouse Sr.'s Advance Publications in New York for $18 million, the largest sum that had been paid at the time for a daily newspaper. The privately-held Advance continues to own the News as well as The Huntsville Times and Mobile's Press-Register, the three largest newspapers in Alabama, as well as their shared website, al.com.

In 1997, the News Company switched the morning and evening publications, making the News the morning paper and the Post-Herald as the evening paper. This move reinforced the News's preeminent role as morning papers were the norm.

On August 10, 2006 the News cut the ribbon on their new headquarters building across 4th Avenue from their 1917 plant. The $25 million, 4-story, 110000 square feet (10,219.3 m²) brick and limestone building, designed by Williams-Blackstock Architects, borrows several details from the older building and is dramatically bisected by a glass atrium. The 1917 building was demolished in 2008 in order to make room for a surface parking lot serving employees of the paper. The lot is between the new office building and the facility that houses The Birmingham News presses.

In 2009, Advance Publications' three Alabama newspapers were organized into the Advance Alabama Group, headed by Ricky Mathews, publisher of the Mobile newspaper. Although Advance owned the News since 1956, the Hanson family continued to run the business until Dec. 1, 2009, when Victor H. Hanson III (1956-), retired at the age of 52. Hanson was replaced by Pam Siddall, previously the publisher of The Wichita Eagle
The Wichita Eagle
The Wichita Eagle is a daily newspaper published in Wichita, Kansas. It is owned by The McClatchy Company, which publishes 31 other newspapers, including The Kansas City Star.It is the largest newspaper in Wichita, Kansas and the surrounding area....

and The Columbus Ledger-Enquirer.

The Birmingham News maintains bureaus in Montgomery and Washington, D.C.

Honors

In 1991, Ron Casey, Harold Jackson and Joey Kennedy received a Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing
Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing
The Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing has been awarded since 1917 for distinguished editorial writing, the test of excellence being clearness of style, moral purpose, sound reasoning, and power to influence public opinion in what the writer conceives to be the right direction...

 for their editorial campaign analyzing inequities in Alabama's tax system and proposing needed reforms.

In 2006, staff photographer Bernard Troncale took top honors at the Society of Professional Journalists' Green Eyeshade Awards for his work on a series about AIDS in Africa.

In 2006 the News editorial staff were finalists for another Pulitzer for Editorial Writing for a series of editorials reversing the paper's longstanding support of the death penalty. That same year the paper won two Awards of Excellence from the Society for News Design
Society for News Design
The Society for News Design is an international organization for professionals working in the news sector of the media industry, specifically those involved with graphic design, illustration, web design and infographics....

 for the paper's overall graphic layout.

In 2007, reporter Brett Blackledge
Brett Blackledge
Brett J. Blackledge is a reporter for The Associated Press in Washington D.C.. While working for The Birmingham News, he won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting for a series on alleged nepotism and cronyism in Alabama's two-year college system.Blackledge was born in Baton Rouge,...

 won the Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting
Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting
The Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting has been awarded since 1953, under one name or another, for a distinguished example of investigative reporting by an individual or team, presented as a single article or series in print journalism...

for his series of articles exposing corruption in Alabama's two-year college system.

Features

Every edition features main news, Local News, Money and Sports sections.

The Monday edition features the TechKnow section.

The Wednesday edition features the Food section and five regional sections: The Hoover News, The North/East News, The Shelby News, The South News, and The West News, covering local stories from those areas.

The Thursday edition features the Health section.

The Friday edition features City Scene, a local entertainment magazine.

The Saturday edition features Spaces, a home design section.

The Sunday edition features Viewpoints, a commentary and opinion section; Play, a leisure magazine; Travel; LifeStyle; and Parade magazine.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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