NEWSPAPER HISTORY

By Carl Turner, date unknown

 

            Waupaca has had a weekly newspaper since shortly after the Waupaca county territory was recognized as such by the young State of Wisconsin in 1851.  There are no known copies of the first publication of the Waupaca Spirit.  Some contend it first appeared in 1852, while others believe it was in 1853.

            But there is no dispute about the fact that the Spirit, of which the Waupaca County Post is a direct descendant, was published for several years before Waupaca officially became a village.

            The earliest copy of the Spirit known to exist is in the Wisconsin State Historical Library in Madison.  It is dated Oct. 3, 1955.  Two brothers, C. E. and J. E. Redfield, were the publishers.

            In the intervening years, a number of other newspapers have appeared on the Waupaca scene, but the County Post alone has served the community and its large trading area since 1934.

            The County Post forged ahead to leadership in the Wisconsin weekly newspaper field in the decade preceding the centennial year, 1957.  It became Wisconsin’s largest weekly – largest in number of pages printed, in news content, and in advertising lineage.

            In 1956, the County Post averaged 28 pages per issue, and was the first weekly newspaper in Wisconsin – perhaps the nation – to furnish its readers every week a complete tabloid television section edited and printed at home.  The County Post launched its own TV section – Central Wisconsin TV News – on Dec. 1, 1954, before many big city dailies began publishing TV sections.

            But to get back to the Waupaca Spirit – it was a 6-column, 4-page paper published by the Redfields until March, 1856, when they sold it J. H. and S. H. Jones.  The new owners suspended publication before the end of that year, and the Redfields returned to revive the Spirit.

            Some years later, they sold to Messrs. Dewey and Terrell but they, too, evidently found the going rough, for the Redfields returned once more, in about 1860.  They continued to publish the Spirit until 1866, when they sold to Leslie J. Perry.

            Perry changed the name from the Spirit to the Criterion and was the publisher until 1869, when the Criterion was merged with another Waupaca newspaper, the Republican.

            The Republican had been founded in 1867 by Judge C. S. Ogden, after whom the village of Ogdensburg is named.  Five years after the merger with the Criterion, Judge Ogden, in 1872, sold to Charles M. Bright.

A. T. Glaze bought out Bright in 1879, but two years later turned the newspaper over to C. N. Hodges, who died a year later.  The next owner was W. H. Holmes, who was the publisher for 25 years.  Holmes sold the Republican in 1908 to D. F. Burnham and L. A. Brown.

Meantime, in 1878, a new paper, the Waupaca Post, was started by Judge Ogden’s son, J. A. Ogden, and H. K. Pitcher.  They sold the Post two years later to E. E. Gordon of New London.

There is no reliable record of ownership of the Post for the next 20 years, but it continued to be published and to gain prominence.

In December, 1908, a corporation comprising D. F. Burnham, J. H. Christenson and S. C. Simonson, was formed to effect a merger to the Waupaca County Republican and the Waupaca Post, and the Post Printing Co. published the first issue of the Waupaca Republican-Post on Jan. 1, 1909.  Here is where the lineage dating back to the Spirit joined that of the Post.

Several more newspapers were to appear in Waupaca, but in time all came under the wing of the Republican-Post.  One of these was the Waupaca Record-Leader, which was merged with the Republican-Post in 1917.  Stockholders of the two papers incorporated as the Waupaca Leader Co., and for the first time called the newspaper the Waupaca County Post.

On Sept. 1, 1921, Robert H. Wright, formerly of Clintonville, started the Waupaca County News, but on Feb. 15, 1934, that paper was sold to the County Post.

Another dozen years elapsed before there was another change in newspaper ownership.  Then, on March 6, 1946, Burnham and his associates, J. Henry Christenson, Ellsworth P. Barrington and George Lindahl, sold the County Post to Kyle D. and Fay A. Warner.  The latter had worked for Burnham as a printer and Kyle had owned a newspaper in Iowa.

The Warners made numerous improvements, adding many rural correspondents and occasionally publishing a photo.  But this partnership owned the County Post for only 2-1/2 years, selling it on Sept. 1, 1958 to the present owner, the Waupaca County Publishing Co.

The new publishing firm was incorporated principally by Carl L. Turner and Ward J. Risvold, then owners of the Clintonville Tribune-Gazette, with Turner moving to Waupaca as publisher of the County Post.  When the partners bought the Clintonville paper on Nov. 1, 1945, Turner had been with International News Service in many states for 22 years and Risvold had been a business representative for King Features Syndicate for 15 years.

Two years after they bought the Waupaca property, Risvold sold his interest in the County Post to Turner and the latter, in turn, sold his interest in the Clintonville Tribune-Gazette to Risvold.  This occurred on Sept. 18, 1950.

Immediately after buying the County Post, the Waupaca County Publishing Co. launched a program of modernization.  The first step was extensive use of local and area news pictures.  Press cameras were purchased, newsmen were taught how to use them, and the paper installed its own photo laboratory.

            Soon the County Post installed its own photo engraving machine for rapid production of plates from which pictures are printed.  Not long afterward, the Post outgrew the old hand-fed newspaper press on which only four pages could be printed at a time, and then only on one side.  A high-speed Duplex press was purchased, using roll paper and printing 3,000 complete 8-page sections an hour. Other improvements in the composing room followed, to keep apace the growth of the County Post.

Here is how the paper has grown:  In 1947, the year before the present owner took over, the County Post printed 656 pages in its 52 weekly issues.  In 1956, the same paper printed 1,456, more than doubling the size in a decade.

The Waupaca County Post owns two other publications besides Wisconsin TV News.  For 12 weeks in summer, during the vacation season, it published the Chain o’ Lakes Picture Post, a tabloid picture weekly of from 20 to 36 pages.  Picture Post was started in 1950.

The other affiliate is the Central Wisconsin Farmer, strictly a rural weekly, started in 1956 and serving a large section of Central Wisconsin.  Its circulation totals 7,1000.  Separate editorial staffs produce each of the affiliated newspapers.