The ''New Orleans Item-Tribune'', sometimes rendered in press accounts as the ''New Orleans Item and Tribune'', was an American
newspaper
A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background.
Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as politics, business, sports a ...
published in
,
Louisiana
Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...
, in various forms from 1871 to 1958.
Early history
The newspaper, referred to in 1941 as "the south's oldest afternoon daily paper",
was first published in 1875 as ''The New Orleans Item'', an afternoon paper.
Subscriptions were six dollars a year, and the paper claimed to have the largest circulation in New Orleans, describing itself as "Impartial, Able, Newsy, and Bright."
In 1924, it spawned a morning sister, the ''Morning Tribune''.
The papers published a single Sunday edition, the ''Item-Tribune'',
beginning December 21, 1924.
It expanded its name to become the ''Sunday Item-Tribune'' on February 10, 1935.
Comic-book
A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or (in the United Kingdom and Ireland) simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are oft ...
artist
Jack Sparling worked briefly as a gag cartoonist for the paper circa the late 1930s.
[Jack Sparling]
at the Lambiek Comiclopedia
Galerie Lambiek is a Dutch comic book store and art gallery in Amsterdam, founded on November 8, 1968 by Kees Kousemaker (, – Bussum, ), though since 2007, his son Boris Kousemaker is the current owner. From 1968 to 2015, it was located ...
''Item-Tribune'' years
In 1936, the two papers'
broadsheet
A broadsheet is the largest newspaper format and is characterized by long Vertical and horizontal, vertical pages, typically of . Other common newspaper formats include the smaller Berliner (format), Berliner and Tabloid (newspaper format), ta ...
format was changed to tabloid size, and on January 13, 1941, the papers merged as the daily and Sunday ''Item-Tribune''.
The term was already in use before this, with ''
Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' magazine, for example, referring to the two papers in this combined form in 1926. The ''Tribune'' ceased publication on January 11, 1941, though the ''Sunday Item-Tribune'' did not change its name.
On June 27, 1941, the newspaper's longtime publisher and president, Colonel
James M. Thomson, announced the paper's sale to Ralph Nicholson, vice president, treasurer and general manager of the ''
Tampa Times
The ''Tampa Times'', or ''Tampa Daily Times'', was a daily newspaper founded in Tampa, Florida, in 1893. It was started by the consolidation of two newspapers by the Tampa Publishing Company, whose vice president was W. B. Henderson, a leading b ...
'', with Thomson to serve as president of the Item Co., Inc., the newly formed entity that purchased the paper.
In 1949,
David Stern III
David Stern III (September 2, 1909 – November 22, 2003), also known as David J. Stern was an American prose fiction writer and scriptwriter, sometimes under the name Peter Stirling—that of the human lead opposite his most famous character, Fran ...
, author of the ''
Francis the Talking Mule'' books that later became a
film series, and the son of prominent Philadelphia publisher
J. David Stern
Julius David Stern (April 1, 1886 – October 10, 1971) was an American newspaper publisher, best known as the liberal Democratic publisher of ''The Philadelphia Record'' from 1928 to 1947. He published other newspapers including the ''New York P ...
, purchased the paper for $2 million. He ran the paper until its 1958 merger.
The paper, which is preserved by the
National Endowment for the Humanities
The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...
and
The Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...
from its June 11, 1902, issue through its last, September 14, 1958, was published daily until dropping the Saturday edition beginning December 17, 1950.
Merger with ''Daily States''
In 1958, the ''Item-Tribune'' merged with the ''Daily States'' (founded in 1880) to form the New Orleans ''Daily States-Item''. In 1962, publisher and businessman
Samuel I. Newhouse bought the morning ''
Times-Picayune'' as well as the afternoon ''States-Item'', which continued to be published separately until they were merged and combined in 1980.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:New Orleans Item-Tribune
Defunct newspapers published in Louisiana
Newspapers published in New Orleans
Publications established in 1875
Publications disestablished in 1958
1875 establishments in Louisiana
1958 disestablishments in Louisiana