AGED ONE HUNDRED

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 90, 17 April 1931, Page 5

AGED ONE HUNDRED

NEWSPAPER CENTENARY

IN A [YEAR OF MORTALITY]

In 1931 the hand of death (or should one write suspension?) has 'been .busy, among Sydney daily newspapers, but the year also marks the centenary of: the greatest Australian newspaper suo cess, the "Sydney Morning Herald." The "Daily Guardian," a morning daily born .with Sydney eclat in, 1923, and sold in 1929 with a statement that the circulation exceeded 170,000 a day, and that the annual profits exceeded £20,000, ceased to publish in February; last. The "Daily Guardian" stood for; the "new" journalism; the "Sydney; Morning Herald" for the old. .•■'■ - Perhaps still more remarkable among the newspaper deaths of 19i>l (which included three Sydney dailies) is; that of the "Sydney Evening News," which1 suspended publication' on the ■ 21st. of last month. This .evening daily was about nine times the age of.the ."DailyGuardian." In its time the "Evening News" has been everything, but in recent years it was of the "new school. It was born on 28th July, 1867,' tho first evening daily in Australia. Thus, while one of tho most remarkable modern daily newspaper efforts seen in Australia lasted seven years,and while Australia's first evening paper lasted sixty-three years, the "Sydney Morning Herald," oldest of all, has its hundredth birthday to-mor-row, and starts its second century, younger than any of them. FAMILY NEWSPAPER, NOT "NEW." The "Sydney Morning Herald" has stood like the Rock of Gibraltar. It has "eschewed: the more colourful methods of the 'new' school of journalism." Also, be it noted, this newspaper "has remained with the Fairfax family unto the fourth generation^" . It claims that it has a circulati6n'o£ over 200,000 a day, the greatest of all Australian circulations. Compare tha claim of the New York "Daily-; News'* to "America's biggest daily circulation,----1,307,368"; also the claim of thelilioar doa "Daily Mail" to "the wotl&'s record daily net sale, 1,845,087.*^ -^ " When the "Sydney Morning Herald'f was founded in 1831—known, .jn. thofye' pre-daily days,, as the "Sydney.; He'rai'./'*—there were 'three other newspapf <rs, but in six months its circulation i«ras greater than that of all the others- jmt together. It -was ten years old yijhea. John Fairfax, printer, bought it in.' 1841 ? and thus began the Fairfax con* neotion, which has now lasted ninety] years, not out —a remarkable ex.'Unple of that continuity of family c/bntrol which is becoming rare, but by no means extinct, in the modern, news^ paper world. - A little before John Fairfax bought! the paper it had become (in 1840) aj daily, but the word "Morning"' did not; enter the title until 1842, vi/hen. Mr* Fairfax was selling his daily at ■fourpence a copy. The first Fairfax was" an) English printer, who came tjo Sydneyj in 1838, and died in 1877, aged 73. , As head of the proprietary he V^as followed by Sir James Beading Fairfax. Eater links were Mr.-, Geoffrey 13.' Fairfas (died 1930), and Sir J. O. F.-wirfax (died 1928). The only son of the/last-named^ Mr. Warwick O. Fairfax, is now managing director, representing; the' fourth] generation o£ the proprie fcary. It seems that one of th<» early print* ing overseers of the paper, was Mr. Samuel Bennett, who ia 1867 founded the recently suspendejd '"Evening News.". -.■-.- .-■■■. PBE-lELEGRAPH; NEWS- (( HUNTING. v " The history of the "S|ydney Morning Herald's" century is in a sense the history of the world, and!1 is in a special sense the history of/Australia.. AH Australian development; is reflected id. its columns. For- instance, it record? the arrival of the steamship SophiaJane, 256 tons, "the Jirst vessel.to.turn' a paddle-wheel in Sydney harbour, :and the first to voyage wAder steam td'Ausi tralia." Cable comrAunication wasrnofc established until I?»v2. Every oversea vessel touching th\e -Australian, coast in the old days wa:j raked by reporters for news, and fast;horses often played a part in transmitting that news acrosa communicationless •' sections of the. coin tinent. .' . ' Nearly all the editors down, through the century have been clergymen otj close relations of./ the clergy. The pre* sent editor is a toy preacher. The "Sydney-Morning Herald" cent tenary is a rcjmarkable assertion ol! newspaper life in a year of newspapeij deaths, and is.an indication that thai days of the family daily newspaper; (family in a double sense) are far front over, and that/ the new journalism has in no sense :fswept. the ■• field,: even ii£ the most An-»erican city of the ""Cbn*» monwealth. • ,