The Inverness Courier is a local, bi-weekly newspaper, published each Tuesday and Friday in

Inverness Inverness (; from the gd, Inbhir Nis , meaning "Mouth of the River Ness"; sco, Innerness) is a city in the Scottish Highlands. It is the administrative centre for The Highland Council and is regarded as the capital of the Highlands. Histori ...

Highland Highlands or uplands are areas of high elevation such as a mountainous region, elevated mountainous plateau or high hills. Generally speaking, upland (or uplands) refers to ranges of hills, typically from up to while highland (or highlands) is ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

. It reports on issues in Inverness and the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. It is the longest, continually running local newspaper covering the area.

History

The first issue of ''The Inverness Courier and General Advertiser for the Counties of Inverness, Ross, Moray, Nairn, Cromarty, Sutherland and Caithness'' appeared on 4 Dec 1817. The first editors were Mr. John and Mrs. Johnstone until 1824. Mrs. Christian Isobel Johnstone produced the widely acclaimed ''Meg Dod’s Cookery Book''. Dr. Robert Carruthers was editor from April 1828 until his death in 1878, when his son Walter Carruthers took over until his death in 1885. He was succeeded by James Barron. Walter Carruthers and James Barron were co-founders of

Inverness Field Club Inverness Field Club is based in Inverness in the Highlands of Scotland to promote interest in natural history, geology, archaeology and local history by way of extensive lecture and excursion programmes. It is a partner organisation of Am Bail ...

in 1875. In Feb. 1919, Dr. Evan Macleod Barron became editor, who was the author of ''The Scottish War of Independence''. His niece Eveline Barron became deputy editor in 1952, succeeding him as editor in April 1965. There is no current editor since David Bourn left to edit an English regional daily. A content editor serves several HNM Group titles, including the Courier. The Rev. Alexander Stewart (1829–1901), Minister of Ballachulish & Corran of Ardgour Parish contributed for more than four decades, under the pen-name Nether Lochaber, a more-or-less fortnightly column to the ''Inverness Courier''. This resulted in two publications: ''Nether Lochaber: The Natural History, Legends and Folk-lore of the West Highlands'' (1883) and Twixt Ben Nevis and Glencoe: The Natural History, Legends, and Folk-lore of the West Highlands'' (1885). In May 1933, ''The Inverness Courier'' published the first report of the

Loch Ness monster The Loch Ness Monster ( gd, Uilebheist Loch Nis), affectionately known as Nessie, is a creature in Scottish folklore that is said to inhabit Loch Ness in the Scottish Highlands. It is often described as large, long-necked, and with one or mor ...

. A Courier correspondent, Alexander Campbell, had told of the strange sighting to then editor Evan Barron, who is said to have replied that it must be a monster.

Today

''The Inverness Courier'' is published by

Scottish Provincial Press Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English * Scottish national identity, the Scottish id ...

, which publishes several weekly newspapers in the

council area {{Unreferenced, date=May 2019, bot=noref (GreenC bot) A council area is one of the areas defined in Schedule 1 of the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994 and is under the control of one of the local authorities in Scotland created by that Act. ...

. In 2014, ''The Inverness Courier'' was named the Highlands and Islands newspaper of the year. Due to a massive drop in circulation, this newspaper has had to move from its Longman headquarters, downsize and relocate to offices in Bank Street, Inverness.

References

''The Hub of the Highlands: The Book of Inverness and District. The Centenary Volume of Inverness Field Club 1875–1975'', Inverness Field Club 1975. Ross, Donald, 'Nether Lochaber: Memories of a Well-known Highlander', The Inverness Courier, no. 11943 (20 Jan., 1961), p. 3

External links

Official Website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Inverness Courier Newspapers published in Scotland Mass media in Argyll and Bute Mass media in Highland (council area) Mass media in the Outer Hebrides Newspapers with Scottish Gaelic content Publications established in 1817 1817 establishments in Scotland