Page:History of Oregon Newspapers.pdf/254

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HISTORY OF OREGON NEWSPAPERS
245

For several years she operated the paper's linotype, which was the first typesetting machine she ever had seen.

The Sun's plant was destroyed in a fire which swept the little business district of Sutherlin September 19, 1938. Mr. Hayner did not feel able to start again in such a limited field.

Will Hayner was io years old when he began his printing career, in the office of the Allegany County Reporter, county seat weekly in Belmont, New York. The Reporter had a circulation of 1200 and was printed on a Washington hand-press. "It was my job," Mr Hayner told this writer, "to ink the forms after every paper was printed, and this job generally covered a period from about 4 in the afternoon until 1 or 2 o'clock the following morning-the length of time depending on the amount of beer the pressman drank during the process." After a few years of working on several newspapers in and near Belmont, young Hayner hit the road as a typographical tourist, meeting interesting old-timers and having experiences which have put life into a book he has prepared for publication entitled The Trail of a Typo. He came to Sutherlin from Burley, Idaho, where he had edited the Bulletin for several years. EXTRA!-Just as this proof is being read, the irrepressible old publisher is resuming publication of the Sun (September).

Gardiner and Reedsport.—These little towns on Winchester bay, at the mouth of the Umpqua, have a journalism story going back to 1902, when the Gardiner Gazette was founded by H. C. Davis. His successor at the helm within a few months was O. L. Williams who carried on until 1906, when Miss Edith Smythe took hold. She announced for the 1908 Ayer's directory a circulation of 160 at $1.50 a year. It is therefore not surprising that the community lay fallow journalistically for several years, from 1909 to 1913. Through its early years the paper was printed in the Roseburg Review office.

The Port Umpqua Courier, present Reedsport-Gardiner publication, printed at Reedsport, was established at Gardiner April 24, 1913, by J. H. Austin. He moved the paper to Reedsport in 1918, put in a plant, and began printing the paper in his own office.

Meanwhile George H. Baxter started the Index at Gardiner, continuing after the departure of the Courier. He suspended in 1921.

That same year George J. Ditgen and Maurice Richards became the publishers, and in 1923 were claiming 600 circulation. In 1926 James W. Reed became editor for Ditgen, and the circulatiorn claim was boosted to 1,000. Four years later the paper came into the possession of Reeds, Inc., with Robin Reed, former world's amateur lightweight wrestling champion, brother of James, associated in the concern, and Fred Sefton editor. B. W. Talcott, ex perienced newspaper man with daily experience in Eugene and else where, edited the paper from 1931 to 1933. Since then Robin Reed,