''The Age'' is a daily newspaper in
Melbourne
Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...
, Australia, that has been published since 1854. Owned and published by
Nine Entertainment
Nine Entertainment (registered as Nine Entertainment Co. Pty Ltd) is an Australian publicly listed media company with holdings in radio and television broadcasting, newspaper publications and digital media. It uses Nine as its corporate brand ...
, ''The Age'' primarily serves
Victoria
Victoria most commonly refers to:
* Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia
* Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada
* Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory
* Victoria, Seychelle ...
, but copies also sell in
Tasmania
)
, nickname =
, image_map = Tasmania in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of Tasmania in AustraliaCoordinates:
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdi ...
, the
Australian Capital Territory
The Australian Capital Territory (commonly abbreviated as ACT), known as the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) until 1938, is a landlocked federal territory of Australia containing the national capital Canberra and some surrounding townships. I ...
and border regions of
South Australia
South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...
and southern
New South Wales
)
, nickname =
, image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates:
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, es ...
. It is delivered both in print and digital formats. The newspaper shares some articles with its sister newspaper ''
The Sydney Morning Herald
''The Sydney Morning Herald'' (''SMH'') is a daily compact newspaper published in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, and owned by Nine. Founded in 1831 as the ''Sydney Herald'', the ''Herald'' is the oldest continuously published newspaper ...
''.
''The Age'' is considered a
newspaper of record for Australia, and has variously been known for its investigative reporting, with its journalists having won dozens of
Walkley Awards
The annual Walkley Awards are presented in Australia to recognise and reward excellence in journalism. They cover all media including print, television, documentary, radio, photographic and online media. The Gold Walkley is the highest prize and ...
, Australia's most prestigious journalism prize. , ''The Age'' had a monthly readership of 5.321 million.
History
Foundation
''The Age'' was founded by three Melbourne businessmen: brothers John and Henry Cooke (who had arrived from New Zealand in the 1840s) and Walter Powell. The first edition appeared on 17 October 1854.
Syme family
The venture was not initially a success, and in June 1856 the Cookes sold the paper to
Ebenezer Syme, a Scottish-born businessman, and James McEwan, an ironmonger and founder of McEwans & Co, for £2,000 at auction. The first edition under the new owners came out on 17 June 1856. From its foundation the paper was self-consciously liberal in its politics: "aiming at a wide extension of the rights of free citizenship and a full development of representative institutions", and supporting "the removal of all restrictions upon freedom of commerce, freedom of religion and—to the utmost extent that is compatible with public morality—upon freedom of personal action".
Ebenezer Syme was elected to the
Victorian Legislative Assembly
The Victorian Legislative Assembly is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament of Victoria in Australia; the upper house being the Victorian Legislative Council. Both houses sit at Parliament House in Spring Street, Melbourne.
The presidin ...
shortly after buying ''The Age'', and his brother
David Syme
David Syme (2 October 1827 – 14 February 1908) was a Scottish- Australian newspaper proprietor of ''The Age'' and regarded as "the father of protection in Australia" who had immense influence in the Government of Victoria.C. E. Sayers,Syme, ...
soon came to dominate the paper, editorially and managerially. When Ebenezer died in 1860 David became editor-in-chief, a position he retained until his death in 1908, although a succession of editors did the day-to-day editorial work.
In 1882 ''The Age'' published an eight-part
series
Series may refer to:
People with the name
* Caroline Series (born 1951), English mathematician, daughter of George Series
* George Series (1920–1995), English physicist
Arts, entertainment, and media
Music
* Series, the ordered sets used in ...
written by journalist and future physician
George E. Morrison, who had sailed, undercover, for the
New Hebrides
New Hebrides, officially the New Hebrides Condominium (french: link=no, Condominium des Nouvelles-Hébrides, "Condominium of the New Hebrides") and named after the Hebrides Scottish archipelago, was the colonial name for the island group ...
, while posing as crew of the brigantine
slave ship
Slave ships were large cargo ships specially built or converted from the 17th to the 19th century for transporting slaves. Such ships were also known as "Guineamen" because the trade involved human trafficking to and from the Guinea coast ...
, ''Lavinia'', as it made cargo of
Kanakas
Kanakas were workers (a mix of voluntary and involuntary) from various Pacific Islands employed in British colonies, such as British Columbia (Canada), Fiji, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and Queensland (Australia) in the 19 ...
. By October the series was also being published in ''The Age''s weekly companion magazine, the ''Leader''. "A Cruise in a Queensland Slaver. By a Medical Student" was written in a tone of wonder, expressing "only the mildest criticism"; six months later, Morrison "revised his original assessment", describing details of the schooner's
blackbirding
Blackbirding involves the coercion of people through deception or kidnapping to work as slaves or poorly paid labourers in countries distant from their native land. The term has been most commonly applied to the large-scale taking of people in ...
operation, and sharply denouncing the slave trade in Queensland. His articles, letters to the editor, and newspaper's editorials, led to expanded government intervention.
In 1891, Syme bought out Ebenezer's heirs and McEwan's and became sole proprietor. He built up ''The Age'' into
Victoria
Victoria most commonly refers to:
* Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia
* Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada
* Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory
* Victoria, Seychelle ...
's leading newspaper. In circulation, it soon overtook its rivals ''The Herald'' and ''
The Argus'', and by 1890 it was selling 100,000 copies a day, making it one of the world's most successful newspapers.
![The Age first edition, Melbourne Museum](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/91/The_Age_first_edition%2C_Melbourne_Museum.jpg)
Under Syme's control ''The Age'' exercised enormous political power in Victoria. It supported liberal politicians such as
Graham Berry,
George Higinbotham and
George Turner, and other leading liberals such as
Alfred Deakin and
Charles Pearson
Charles Pearson (4 October 1793 – 14 September 1862) was a British lawyer and politician. He was solicitor to the City of London, a reforming campaigner, and – briefly – Member of Parliament for Lambeth. He campaigned against corruption ...
furthered their careers as ''The Age'' journalists. Syme was originally a
free trade
Free trade is a trade policy that does not restrict imports or exports. It can also be understood as the free market idea applied to international trade. In government, free trade is predominantly advocated by political parties that hold econ ...
r, but converted to
protectionism
Protectionism, sometimes referred to as trade protectionism, is the economic policy of restricting imports from other countries through methods such as tariffs on imported goods, import quotas, and a variety of other government regulatio ...
through his belief that Victoria needed to develop its manufacturing industries behind
tariff
A tariff is a tax imposed by the government of a country or by a supranational union on imports or exports of goods. Besides being a source of revenue for the government, import duties can also be a form of regulation of foreign trade and pol ...
barriers. During the 1890s ''The Age'' was a leading supporter of
Australian federation
The Federation of Australia was the process by which the six separate British self-governing colonies of Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia (which also governed what is now the Northern Territory), and Western A ...
and of the
White Australia policy
The White Australia policy is a term encapsulating a set of historical policies that aimed to forbid people of non-European ethnic origin, especially Asians (primarily Chinese) and Pacific Islanders, from immigrating to Australia, starting i ...
.
After David Syme's death, the paper remained in the hands of his three sons, and his eldest son Herbert became general manager until his death in 1939.
David Syme's will prevented the sale of any equity in the paper during his sons' lifetimes, an arrangement designed to protect family control, but which had the unintended consequence of starving the paper of investment capital for 40 years.
Under the management of Sir Geoffrey Syme (1908–42), and his editors,
Gottlieb Schuler
Gottlieb Frederick Henry Schuler (23 February 1853 – 11 December 1926), who has been referred to authoritatively as G. Frederick H. Schuler or Schüler, was an Australian journalist, editor of ''The Age'' for 26 years from 1900.
Schuler was bor ...
and Harold Campbell, ''The Age'' was unable to modernise, and gradually lost market share to ''
The Argus'' and the tabloid ''
The Sun News-Pictorial
''The Sun News-Pictorial'' (known as ''The Sun'') was a morning daily tabloid newspaper published in Melbourne, Victoria, from 1922 until its merger in 1990 with '' The Herald'' to form the ''Herald-Sun''.
''The Sun News-Pictorial'' was part ...
'', with only its classified advertisement sections keeping the paper profitable. By the 1940s, the paper's circulation was lower than it had been in 1900, and its political influence had also declined. Although it remained more liberal than the extremely conservative ''Argus'', it lost much of its distinct political identity.
The historian Sybil Nolan writes: "Accounts of The Age in these years generally suggest that the paper was second-rate, outdated in both its outlook and appearance. Walker described a newspaper which had fallen asleep in the embrace of the Liberal Party; "querulous", "doddery" and "turgid" are some of the epithets applied by other journalists. It is inevitably criticised not only for its increasing conservatism, but for its failure to keep pace with innovations in layout and editorial technique so dramatically demonstrated in papers like ''The Sun News-Pictorial'' and ''The Herald''."
In 1942, David Syme's last surviving son, Oswald, took over the paper, and began to modernise the paper's appearance and standards of news coverage, removing classified advertisements from the front page and introducing photographs long after other papers had done so.
In 1948, after realising the paper needed outside capital, Oswald persuaded the courts to overturn his father's will and floated David Syme and Co. as a public company, selling £400,000 worth of shares. This sale enabled a badly needed technical upgrade of the newspaper's antiquated production machinery, and defeated a takeover attempt by the
Fairfax family
Members of the Fairfax Family were prominent as Australian media proprietors, especially in the area of newspaper publishing through the company John Fairfax and Sons (later known as Fairfax Media, although the Fairfax family no longe ...
, publishers of ''
The Sydney Morning Herald
''The Sydney Morning Herald'' (''SMH'') is a daily compact newspaper published in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, and owned by Nine. Founded in 1831 as the ''Sydney Herald'', the ''Herald'' is the oldest continuously published newspaper ...
''.
This new lease on life allowed ''The Age'' to recover commercially, and in 1957 it received a great boost when ''The Argus'', after twenty years of financial losses, ceased publication.
1960–present
Oswald Syme retired in 1964 and his grandson
Ranald Macdonald
Ranald MacDonald (February 3, 1824 – August 24, 1894) was the first native English-speaker to teach the English language in Japan, including educating Einosuke Moriyama, one of the chief interpreters to handle the negotiations between Co ...
was appointed managing director at the age of 26 and two years later he appointed
Graham Perkin
Edwin Graham Perkin (16 December 1929 – 16 October 1975) was an Australian journalist and newspaper editor.
Early life
Perkin was born at Hopetoun, Victoria, elder son of Herbert Edwin Perkin, baker, and his wife Iris Lily, née Graham, bo ...
as editor; to ensure that the 36-year-old Perkin was free of board influence, Macdonald took on the role of editor-in-chief, a position he held until 1970. Together they radically changed the paper's format and shifted its editorial line from rather conservative liberalism to a new "left liberalism" characterised by attention to issues such as race, gender, the disabled and the environment, as well as opposition to White Australia and the death penalty.
It also became more supportive of the
Australian Labor Party
The Australian Labor Party (ALP), also simply known as Labor, is the major centre-left political party in Australia, one of two major parties in Australian politics, along with the centre-right Liberal Party of Australia. The party forms t ...
after years of having usually supported the
Coalition. The Liberal
Premier of Victoria
The premier of Victoria is the head of government in the Australian state of Victoria. The premier is appointed by the governor of Victoria, and is the leader of the political party able to secure a majority in the Victorian Legislative Assemb ...
,
Henry Bolte
Sir Henry Edward Bolte GCMG (20 May 1908 – 4 January 1990) was an Australian politician who served as the 38th Premier of Victoria. To date he is the longest-serving Victorian premier, having been in office for over 17 consecutive years.
...
, subsequently called ''The Age'' "that pinko rag" in a view conservatives have maintained ever since. Former editor Michael Gawenda in his book ''American Notebook'' wrote that the "default position of most journalists at ''The Age'' was on the political Left." In 1966, the Syme family shareholders joined with Fairfax to create a 50/50 voting partnership which guaranteed editorial independence and forestalled takeover moves from newspaper proprietors in Australia and overseas. This lasted for 17 years, until Fairfax bought controlling interest in 1972.
Perkin's editorship coincided with
Gough Whitlam
Edward Gough Whitlam (11 July 191621 October 2014) was the 21st prime minister of Australia, serving from 1972 to 1975. The longest-serving federal leader of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) from 1967 to 1977, he was notable for being the ...
's reforms of the Labor Party, and ''The Age'' became a key supporter of the Whitlam government, which came to power in
1972
Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using mean solar tim ...
. Contrary to subsequent mythology, however, ''The Age'' was not an uncritical supporter of Whitlam, and played a leading role in exposing the
Loans Affair, one of the scandals which contributed to the demise of the Whitlam government. It was one of many papers to call for Whitlam's resignation on 15 October 1975. Its editorial that day, "Go now, go decently", began, "We will say it straight, and clear, and at once. The Whitlam Government has run its course." It would be Perkin's last editorial; he died the next day.
After Perkin's death, ''The Age'' returned to a more moderate liberal position. While it criticised
Whitlam's dismissal later that year, it supported
Malcolm Fraser
John Malcolm Fraser (; 21 May 1930 – 20 March 2015) was an Australian politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Australia from 1975 to 1983, holding office as the leader of the Liberal Party of Australia.
Fraser was raised on hi ...
's Liberal government in its early years. However, after 1980 it became increasingly critical and was a leading supporter of
Bob Hawke's reforming government after 1983. But from the 1970s, the political influence of ''The Age'', as with other
broadsheet newspapers, derived less from what it said in its editorial columns (which relatively few people read) than from the opinions expressed by journalists, cartoonists, feature writers and guest columnists. ''The Age'' has always kept a stable of leading editorial cartoonists, notably
Les Tanner
Les Tanner (15 June 1927 – 23 July 2001) was an Australian cartoonist and journalist.
Life
Les Tanner was born in Redfern, Sydney. He began drawing at the age of five, at went to school at Glebe Primary School and North Newtown Intermedi ...
,
Bruce Petty
Bruce Leslie Petty, born 23 November 1929 at Doncaster, a suburb of Melbourne, is one of Australia's best known political satirists and cartoonists.[Ron Tandberg
Ronald Peter Tandberg (31 December 1943 – 8 January 2018) was an Australian illustrator and political cartoonist who contributed to ''The Age'' newspaper in Melbourne, Australia from 1972. Tandberg's credits include eleven Walkley Awards. He w ...](_ ...<br></span></div>, <div class=)
and
Michael Leunig
Michael Leunig (born 2 June 1945), typically referred to as Leunig (his signature on his cartoons), is an Australian cartoonist. His works include ''The Curly Pyjama Letters'', cartoon books ''The Essential Leunig'', ''The Wayward Leunig'', ' ...
.
In 1983, Fairfax bought out the remaining shares in David Syme & Co., which became a subsidiary of John Fairfax & Co. Macdonald was criticised by some members of the Syme family (who nevertheless accepted Fairfax's generous offer for their shares), but he argued that ''The Age'' was a natural partner for Fairfax's flagship property, ''The Sydney Morning Herald''. He believed the greater resources of the Fairfax group would enable ''The Age'' to remain competitive. By the mid-1960s a new competitor had appeared in
Rupert Murdoch
Keith Rupert Murdoch ( ; born 11 March 1931) is an Australian-born American business magnate. Through his company News Corp, he is the owner of hundreds of local, national, and international publishing outlets around the world, including ...
's national daily ''
The Australian
''The Australian'', with its Saturday edition, ''The Weekend Australian'', is a broadsheet newspaper published by News Corp Australia since 14 July 1964.Bruns, Axel. "3.1. The active audience: Transforming journalism from gatekeeping to gatew ...
'', which was first published on 15 July 1964. In 1999 David Syme & Co. became The Age Company Ltd, finally ending the Syme connection.
![The Age Collins St 2010](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/13/The_Age_Collins_St_2010.jpg)
''The Age'' was published from offices in
Collins Street until 1969, when it moved to 250
Spencer Street
Spencer Street is a major street and thoroughfare in the central business district of Melbourne, Victoria. The street was gazetted in 1837 as the westernmost boundary of the Hoddle Grid.
Spencer Street is named for John Spencer, 3rd Earl Spenc ...
(hence the nickname "The Spencer Street Soviet" favoured by some critics). In 2003, ''The Age'' opened a new printing centre at
Tullamarine
Tullamarine is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, north-west of Melbourne's Central Business District, located within the Cities of Brimbank, Hume and Merri-bek local government areas. Tullamarine recorded a population of 6,733 at t ...
. The Headquarters moved again in 2009 to Collins Street opposite
Southern Cross station
Southern Cross railway station (until 2005 known as Spencer Street station) is a major railway station in Docklands, Melbourne. It is on Spencer Street, between Collins and La Trobe Streets, at the western edge of the Melbourne central busi ...
. Since acquisition by Nine, the headquarters was moved to 717 Bourke St, Docklands, Melbourne, Victoria, which is also tenanted by Nine.
In 2004, editor Michael Gawenda was succeeded as editor by British journalist
Andrew Jaspan
Andrew Jaspan AM (born 20 April 1952) is a British-Australian journalist and Founding Director and Editor-in-Chief of 360info. He is the Founder of ''The Conversation''. He was previously editor-in-chief of Melbourne's''The Age'', editor o ...
, who was in turn replaced by Paul Ramadge in 2008.
''The Age'' has been known for its tradition of
investigative reporting
Investigative journalism is a form of journalism in which reporters deeply investigate a single topic of interest, such as serious crimes, political corruption, or corporate wrongdoing. An investigative journalist may spend months or years res ...
. In 1984, the newspaper reported what became known as "The Age Tapes" affair, which revealed recordings made by police of alleged corrupt dealings between organised crime figures, politicians and public officials and which sparked the
Stewart Royal Commission. The paper's extensive reporting on malpractice in Australia's banking sector led to a Royal Commission being announced by the
Turnbull Government into the financial services industry, and with ''The Age's'' journalist
Adele Ferguson
Adele Ferguson is an Australian investigative journalist, best known for her series of exposés of malfeasance in the franchising, aged care, and financial services sectors in Australia which have resulted in major inquiries including the Hayn ...
awarded the
Gold Walkley
The Gold Walkley is the major award of the Walkley Awards
The annual Walkley Awards are presented in Australia to recognise and reward excellence in journalism. They cover all media including print, television, documentary, radio, photographic ...
. A series of stories in ''The Age'' between 2009 and 2015 about alleged corruption involving subsidiaries of Australia's central bank, the
Reserve Bank
A central bank, reserve bank, or monetary authority is an institution that manages the currency and monetary policy of a country or monetary union,
and oversees their commercial banking system. In contrast to a commercial bank, a central ba ...
, led to Australia's first ever prosecutions of companies and businessman for foreign bribery. In 2017, the paper's deputy editor Michael Bachelard was awarded the
Gold Walkley
The Gold Walkley is the major award of the Walkley Awards
The annual Walkley Awards are presented in Australia to recognise and reward excellence in journalism. They cover all media including print, television, documentary, radio, photographic ...
for ''The Age's'' reports on the liberation of Mosul after the defeat of Islamic State. ''The Age's'' reporting of the
Unaoil
Unaoil is a Monaco based company which provides "industrial solutions to the energy sector in the Middle East, Central Asia and Africa." Unaoil is incorporated in the British Virgin Islands, a tax haven with an opaque banking system.
History
The ...
international bribery scandal led to investigations by anti-corruption agencies in the UK, US, across Europe and Australia and several businessmen pleading guilty for paying bribes in nine countries over 17 years.
In February 2007, ''The Age's'' editorial section argued that Australian citizen David Hicks should be released as a prisoner from
Guantanamo Bay, stating that Mr Hicks was no hero and "probably downright deluded and dangerous" but the case for releasing him was just, given he was being held without charge or trial.
In 2009, ''The Age'' suspended its columnist
Michael Backman
Michael Backman (born 19 September 1967) is an Australian-born writer who now resides in London. Much of his writing relates to Asia's economies, business, culture and politics.
Writing and ideas
Michael Backman has written widely about the ill ...
after one of his columns condemned Israeli tourists as greedy and badly behaved, prompting criticism that he was
anti-semitic. A
Press Council complaint against ''The Age'' for its handling of the complaints against Backman was dismissed.
In 2014 ''The Age'' put a photograph of an innocent man, Abu Bakar Alam, on the front page, mistakenly identifying him as the perpetrator of the
2014 Endeavour Hills stabbings
On 23 September 2014, 18-year-old Abdul Numan Haider attacked two counter-terrorism police officers with a knife outside the Victoria Police Endeavour Hills police station located in Endeavour Hills, a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. ...
. As part of the settlement the newspaper donated $20,000 towards building a mosque in nearby
Doveton
Doveton is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 31 km south-east of Melbourne's Central Business District, located within the City of Casey local government area. Doveton recorded a population of 9,603 at the 2021 census.
Doveton ...
.
, three editions of ''The Age'' are printed nightly: the NAA edition, for interstate and country Victorian readers, the MEA edition, for metropolitan areas and a final late metropolitan edition.
Like its Fairfax stablemate ''The Sydney Morning Herald'', ''The Age'' announced in early 2007 that it would be moving from a broadsheet format to the smaller
Berliner
Berliner is most often used to designate a citizen of Berlin, Germany
Berliner may also refer to:
People
* Berliner (surname)
Places
* Berliner Lake, a lake in Minnesota, United States
* Berliner Philharmonie, concert hall in Berlin, Germany
...
size, in the footsteps of ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'' and ''
The Courier-Mail
''The Courier-Mail'' is an Australian newspaper published in Brisbane. Owned by News Corp Australia, it is published daily from Monday to Saturday in tabloid format. Its editorial offices are located at Bowen Hills, in Brisbane's inner northe ...
''.
In December 2016, editor-in-chief Mark Forbes was stood down from his position pending the result of a sexual harassment investigation and was replaced by Alex Lavelle, who served for four years as chief editor.
In September 2020, it was announced that The Age's former Washington correspondent
Gay Alcorn
Gay Alcorn is an Australian journalist and newspaper editor. She was appointed editor of ''The Age'' in September 2020. Her sister Margo Kingston is also a journalist.
Career
Alcorn studied arts and law at the University of Queensland. She began ...
would be appointed editor of ''The Age'', the first woman to hold the position in the paper's history.
Headquarters
''The Age''s purpose-built former headquarters, named Media House, was located at 655 Collins St, Docklands, Melbourne, Victoria. After acquisition by Nine, ''The Age'' moved to 717 Bourke St, Docklands, Melbourne, Victoria to be co-located with their new owners.
Masthead
''The Age''s
masthead has received a number of updates since 1854. The most recent update to the design was made in 2002. The current masthead features a stylised version of the
royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom
The royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom, or the royal arms for short, is the arms of dominion of the British monarch, currently King Charles III. These arms are used by the King in his official capacity as monarch of the United Kingdom. Vari ...
and "The Age" in
Electra bold type. The coat of arms features the French motto ''Dieu et mon droit'' ("God and my right"). According to ''The Age''s art director, Bill Farr: "No one knows why they picked the royal crest. But I guess we were a colony at the time, and to be seen to be linked with the Empire would be a positive thing." The original 1854 masthead included the Colony of Victoria crest. In 1856, that crest was removed and in 1861, the royal coat of arms was introduced. This was changed again in 1967, with the shield and decoration altered and the lion crowned. In 1971, a bold typeface was introduced and the crest shield rounded and less ornate. In 1997, the masthead was stacked and contained in a blue box (with the logo in white). In 2002, in conjunction with an overall revamp of the paper, the masthead was redesigned in its present form.
Photography
Though Hugh Bull was appointed the newspaper's first full-time photographer as early as 1927, it was comparatively late in the history of ''The Age'' that photographs were used on the front page as a matter of course, but they became, especially under the editorship of Graham Perkin and his successors, a vital part of its identity, with picture credits for staff photographers, and their images, often uncropped, run across several columns.
A photographer of the rival ''
Herald Sun'' Jay Town distinguishes the 'house style'; "There's a big difference between the set-up, cheesy, tight and bright ''Herald Sun''-type
hotographand then the nice, broadsheet picture–well, back when the Age was a fantastic broadsheet that could really showcase their photographers' work." This distinction was to start to break down in 1983 with the pooling of photographers across all Fairfax publications, and the paper's change in format from broadsheet to 'compact' in 2007, preceding move to online publication and subscription; 2014 saw Fairfax Media shedding 75 per cent of its photographers.
In its heyday the newspaper was a significant step in the career of notable Australian news photographers and photojournalists, many of whom started as cadets. They include:
* Hugh Bull
* Bryan Charlton
* John Lamb
* Ron Lovitt
* Bill McAuley
* Fiona McDougall
* Justin McManus
* Simon O’Dwyer
* Bruce Postle
*
Michael Rayner
Michael Rayner (6 December 1932 – 13 July 2015)Mackie, David. "Obituaries: Michael Rayner", ''Gilbert and Sullivan News'', Vol. V, No. 9, Autumn/Winter 2015, pp. 17–18, The Gilbert and Sullivan Society was an English opera singer, best kno ...
* Sandy Scheltema
* Jason South
* Penny Stephens
Ownership
In 1972,
John Fairfax Holdings
Fairfax Media was a media company in Australia and New Zealand, with investments in newspaper, magazines, radio and digital properties. The company was founded by John Fairfax as John Fairfax and Sons, who purchased ''The Sydney Morning Herald ...
bought a majority of David Syme's shares, and in 1983 bought out all the remaining shares.
On 26 July 2018, Nine Entertainment Co. and
Fairfax Media
Fairfax Media was a media company in Australia and New Zealand, with investments in newspaper, magazines, radio and digital properties. The company was founded by John Fairfax as John Fairfax and Sons, who purchased ''The Sydney Morning Herald' ...
, the parent company of ''The Age'', announced they agreed on terms for a merger between the two companies to become Australia's largest media company. Nine shareholders will own 51.1 per cent of the combined entity, and Fairfax shareholders will own 48.9 per cent.
Printing
''The Age'' was published from its office in Collins Street until 1969, when the newspaper moved to 250
Spencer Street
Spencer Street is a major street and thoroughfare in the central business district of Melbourne, Victoria. The street was gazetted in 1837 as the westernmost boundary of the Hoddle Grid.
Spencer Street is named for John Spencer, 3rd Earl Spenc ...
. In July 2003, the $220 million five-storey Age Print Centre was opened at Tullamarine.
The Centre produced a wide range of publications for both Fairfax and commercial clients. Among its stable of daily print publications are ''The Age'', ''The Australian Financial Review'' and the ''
Bendigo Advertiser
The ''Bendigo Advertiser'' (commonly referred to as ''"The Addy"'') is an Australian regional newspaper. It is the daily (Monday–Saturday) newspaper for Bendigo, Victoria, and its surrounding region. The paper is published by Australian Communi ...
''. The building was sold in 2014, and printing was to be transferred to "regional presses".
Editors
See also
*
Journalism in Australia
Journalism in Australia is an industry with an extensive history. Reporters Without Borders placed Australia 26th on a list of 180 countries ranked by press freedom in 2020, ahead of both the United Kingdom and United States. Print media in t ...
*
List of newspapers in Australia
References
Further reading
* Merrill, John C. and Harold A. Fisher. ''The world's great dailies: profiles of fifty newspapers'' (1980) pp 44–50
*C. E. Sayers, ''David Syme'', Cheshire 1965
*Don Hauser, ''The Printers of the Streets and Lanes of Melbourne (1837–1975)'
Nondescript Press Melbourne 2006.
External links
theage.com.au– ''The Age'' website
about.theage.com.au– ''The Age'' corporate website
inside.theage.com.au– ''The Age'' information hub
Half a century of obscurity(Sybil Nolan on the history of ''The Age'')
Sir Geoffrey Syme"Sir Geoffrey Syme Journalist & Managing Editor of ''The Age'' from 1908 until 1942"
''The Age,''Google news archive.
—PDF files of 32,807 issues, dating from 1854 to 1989.
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Age, The
Newspapers published in Melbourne
Newspapers established in 1854
1854 establishments in Australia
Fairfax Media
Australian news websites
Fairfax Media
Daily newspapers published in Australia
Nine Entertainment