Winnipeg Tribune

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The Winnipeg Tribune

Type	Daily Newspaper
Format	Broadsheet

Owner	Southam Newspapers
Founded	January 28, 1890
Language	English
Ceased publication	August 27, 1980
Headquarters	257 Smith St., Winnipeg, Manitoba
Circulation	100,000
ISSN	{{{1}}}

Website: http://umanitoba.ca/libraries/archives/tribune/ (Archives)

The Winnipeg Tribune was a metropolitan daily newspaper serving Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada from January 28, 1890 to August 27, 1980. The paper was founded by R.L. Richardson and D.L. McIntyre who acquired the press and premises of the old Winnipeg Sun newspaper. It was often viewed as a liberal newspaper focused on local news and events. The paper was owned by Southam Inc at the time of its demise. It was frequently referred to as The Trib.

1 History
2 References
3 External links

[edit] History

[edit] 1900–1950

During the Winnipeg General Strike in 1919, the newspaper sided with the Citizens' Committee of 1000, declaring, "Winnipeg is now under the Soviet system of government."

Southam bought the paper in 1920.

[edit] 1960s

On Friday, September 5, 1969 the Trib replaced its small user-folded tv listings printed on yellow paper with a glossy-covered 32-page booklet called TV Times.^[1] The tv magazine was also featured in the Ottawa Citizen and the Montreal Gazette.

[edit] 1970s

On Sunday, June 21, 1970 a new Centrex telephone system was installed for advertisers and subscribers to use when calling. This allowed direct dialing without requiring the person to first contact the switchboard operator.^[2]

By the mid-1970s the Trib's daily circulation figures began to slip to 70,000, and was falling. The Southam chain decided to totally redesign the paper. The new design made its debut on September 6, 1975. Although the offset press was capable of printing a 112-page newspaper, the September 6 edition was 124-pages, including the 48-page Trib Classifieds. This forced the press operators to print the Trib Lifestyle section separately.^[3] Within a few months, The Trib's ciculation gained 30,000 paid readers, which made the upgrade a success.

A few days before the design change, on September 1st, they made all private sale listings in the Trib Classified free in the form of a Want-Ad Free-for-All promotion.

In response to fierce competition between the Winnipeg Free Press and Winnipeg Tribune in the late 1970s, the Trib tried to attract more subscribers by offering Free Classified Ads.

In March 1979, they had bought some space atop the Casa Loma building (Portage Avenue & Sherbrook Street) to hold Winnipeg's largest billboard. The sign read "[logo] With the Trib, it's Winnipeg. First." The billboard was designed by the advertising firm Martel-Stewart Ltd. and was larger than any billboard seen in Winnipeg ever, and the largest in all of Western Canada. It measured 23 feet tall by 60 feet wide, and had 4,200 light bulbs. The billboard space had previously been used by Export A cigarettes as far back as 1959.^[4]

When Southam's weekend magazine The Canadian merged with FP Newspapers' Weekend, The Trib decided to differentiate itself from the Free Press by creating the locally written tabloid, Trib Magazine started November 24, 1979.^[5]

The trademark name is now owned by the Tribune's old rival, the Winnipeg Free Press.

A number of employees from the paper later helped form the Winnipeg Sun.

The University of Manitoba Archives and Special Collections holds a collection of over 500 000 photographs, 250 000 newspaper clippings arranged into morgue files and microfilm copies of the newspaper.

[edit] References

^ "Trib to Offer TV magazine", Winnipeg Tribune, August 29, 1969.
^ "Trib's new phone system", Winnipeg Tribune, June 19, 1970, pp. 1.
^ Haslam, Gerry. "Oh, Oh, Oh you Trib!", Winnipeg Tribune, September 6, 1975, pp. 1.
^ "The Trib's new sign a blockbuster", Winnipeg Tribune, March 16, 1979, pp. 13.
^ "Another FIRST", Winnipeg Tribune, November 23, 1979, pp. 34.