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Guy Gannett Communications
Guy Gannett Communications was a family-owned business consisting of newspapers in Maine and a handful of television stations in the eastern United States. The company was founded by its namesake, Guy P. Gannett, in 1921, and was managed by a family trust from 1954 to 1998, when it sold most of its properties to The Seattle Times Company and Sinclair Broadcast Group.
William Howard Gannett, of Augusta, Maine, first published Comfort magazine in 1888—an eight-page advertisement for a patent medicine—but it was his son, Guy Patterson Gannett, who headed the push into daily journalism. After a stint helping with the magazine after leaving Yale University in 1901, the junior Gannett went into local politics. By 1920, he was a prominent citizen in Augusta, Maine. Two daily newspaper owners representing the Portland Herald and the Portland Daily Press approached him and asked him to buy them out. Gannett invested in both companies.
In 1921, he completed his purchase of the two Portland papers, merging them into one Portland Press Herald, and also bought the Waterville Morning Sentinel in Waterville, Maine. In 1925 he added, for US$550,000, the Portland Evening Express and Daily Advertiser and Portland Sunday Telegram. Four years later, Guy Gannett Publishing Co. tacked on the Kennebec Journal in Augusta.
At first, the company expanded beyond newspapers with WGAN radio (1938) and television (1954) stations in Portland only (WGAN-TV was renamed WGME in 1983). In 1967, Guy Gannett Communications began to buy television properties outside Maine.
On February 1, 1991, succumbing to industry-wide declines in revenues at afternoon newspapers, Guy Gannett Communications closed the Evening Express and merged it with the Portland Press Herald. Daily circulation of the Express was given at 22,000 to 23,000.
In early 1998, the family trust decided to sell the company, leading to worries among some, such as Press Herald managing editor Curt Hazlett, that the Guy Gannett papers could lose the qualities he associated with family-owned journalism:
This place has been committed to quality, which means we're a little fat on the news side. That's a price this company has been willing to pay because we cover the community pretty well. The question is whether someone coming in from the outside will be willing to do that.
Although they entertained offers from Journal Register Company and MediaNews Group, which had strong properties in nearby Massachusetts, Guy Gannett's managers decided to sell their newspapers to The Seattle Times Company, which had previously operated only within the state of Washington. Seattle Times, run by the fourth generation of the Blethen family, which had its roots in Maine, won out because of shared values.
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Guy Gannett Communications
Guy Gannett Communications was a family-owned business consisting of newspapers in Maine and a handful of television stations in the eastern United States. The company was founded by its namesake, Guy P. Gannett, in 1921, and was managed by a family trust from 1954 to 1998, when it sold most of its properties to The Seattle Times Company and Sinclair Broadcast Group.
William Howard Gannett, of Augusta, Maine, first published Comfort magazine in 1888—an eight-page advertisement for a patent medicine—but it was his son, Guy Patterson Gannett, who headed the push into daily journalism. After a stint helping with the magazine after leaving Yale University in 1901, the junior Gannett went into local politics. By 1920, he was a prominent citizen in Augusta, Maine. Two daily newspaper owners representing the Portland Herald and the Portland Daily Press approached him and asked him to buy them out. Gannett invested in both companies.
In 1921, he completed his purchase of the two Portland papers, merging them into one Portland Press Herald, and also bought the Waterville Morning Sentinel in Waterville, Maine. In 1925 he added, for US$550,000, the Portland Evening Express and Daily Advertiser and Portland Sunday Telegram. Four years later, Guy Gannett Publishing Co. tacked on the Kennebec Journal in Augusta.
At first, the company expanded beyond newspapers with WGAN radio (1938) and television (1954) stations in Portland only (WGAN-TV was renamed WGME in 1983). In 1967, Guy Gannett Communications began to buy television properties outside Maine.
On February 1, 1991, succumbing to industry-wide declines in revenues at afternoon newspapers, Guy Gannett Communications closed the Evening Express and merged it with the Portland Press Herald. Daily circulation of the Express was given at 22,000 to 23,000.
In early 1998, the family trust decided to sell the company, leading to worries among some, such as Press Herald managing editor Curt Hazlett, that the Guy Gannett papers could lose the qualities he associated with family-owned journalism:
This place has been committed to quality, which means we're a little fat on the news side. That's a price this company has been willing to pay because we cover the community pretty well. The question is whether someone coming in from the outside will be willing to do that.
Although they entertained offers from Journal Register Company and MediaNews Group, which had strong properties in nearby Massachusetts, Guy Gannett's managers decided to sell their newspapers to The Seattle Times Company, which had previously operated only within the state of Washington. Seattle Times, run by the fourth generation of the Blethen family, which had its roots in Maine, won out because of shared values.