The News Chief is a daily paper located in Winter Haven, Florida that serves east Polk County, Florida. It is owned by Gannett and is located at 455 Sixth St. N.W.

The News Chief traces its beginnings to September 28, 1911, when the first edition of the weekly Florida Chief was published by its founder, M.M. "Dad" Lee.

Everything originally was handset, but, within four years, Lee had moved the newspaper to larger quarters and eventually acquired three linotype machines. During its 10th anniversary in September 1921, the newspaper went to twice-a-week publication, and three years later went to five days a week, Monday through Friday.

Lee continued the newspaper through two severe hurricanes (1926 and 1933), a fire (1930) and the Great Depression before selling the newspaper in January 1948 to W.W. Galvin of Ohio.

Galvin immediately acquired a weekly, The Winter Haven News, and combined it with the Florida Chief into the News Chief.

The newspaper eventually passed to the W.E. "Bill" Rynerson family, which later acquired the weekly Auburndale Star.

Disaster struck on Nov. 13, 1954, when a major fire destroyed the News Chief's downtown Winter Haven building and severely damaged most of the equipment.

A four-page Sunday edition was printed at The Winter Haven Herald to keep intact the record of not missing a scheduled publication day.