The Advertiser (Adelaide)

The Advertiser

Prince William and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, on front page of The Advertiser on 23 July 2013
Type Daily newspaper
Format Tabloid
(since November 1997)
Owner(s) News Corp Australia
Founder(s) Rev John Henry Barrow
Editor Sam Weir
Founded 1858 as The South Australian Advertiser
Headquarters 31 Waymouth Street,
Adelaide, SA, Australia
Website www.adelaidenow.com.au (note: some premium articles may be only accessed by subscription)[1]

The Advertiser is a conservative, daily tabloid-format newspaper published in the city of Adelaide, South Australia. First published as a broadsheet named The South Australian Advertiser on 12 July 1858,[2] it is currently printed daily from Monday to Saturday. A Sunday edition exists under the name of the Sunday Mail. The Advertiser is a publication of News Corp Australia.

The head office of The Advertiser has relocated from a former premises in King William Street, to a new office complex, known as Keith Murdoch House at 31 Waymouth Street.

History

The office of The Advertiser in Waymouth Street, Adelaide

The Adelaide 'Times' ceased publication on May 9, 1858.

Shortly afterwards, Reverend John Henry Barrow, a former editor of the South Australian Register founded the morning newspaper The South Australian Advertiser and a companion weekly The South Australian Weekly Chronicle, whose first issues were published on 12 July 1858 and 17 July 1858 respectively.[3][4] The South Australian Advertiser was published from 12 July 1858 (Vol 1, no 1) to 22 March 1889 (Vol 31, no 9493). The original owners were Barrow and Charles Henry Goode.

In 1863 the company started an afternoon newspaper The Express as a competitor to The Telegraph, an evening paper independent of both The Advertiser and The Register.[5]

The company was re-formed, effective 9 September 1864, with additional shareholders Philip Henry Burden, John Baker, Captain Scott, James Counsell, Thomas Graves and some others.[6]

Burden, secretary of the company, died in 1864, and Barrow, whose wife had died in 1856, married his widow in 1865, thus owning together a quarter of the company.

In December, 1866, the syndicate bought the afternoon Adelaide daily, the Telegraph, at auction, and incorporated it with The Express (by this time renamed The Daily Telegraph with a morning edition and a weekend Weekly Mail) as The Express and Telegraph.[5]

In 1871, when the shareholders were Barrow, Goode, Robert Stuckey, Thomas Graves, William Parkin, Thomas King, James Counsell, and George Williams Chinner, the partnership was dissolved and the business was carried on by Barrow and King.[7] It continued from 1889 as The Advertiser[2]

J. H. Barrow died on 22 August 1874, and Thomas King ran the papers for himself and Mrs. Barrow for about five years.[5]

In 1879 a new firm was created, consisting of Thomas King, Fred Burden (son of P. H. Burden and adopted son of J. H. Barrow), and John Langdon Bonython. In July, 1884, Thomas King dropped out, and the firm of Burden & Bonython was formed to run the paper.[5]

In December 1891, F. B. Burden retired, and sold his share to (from 1898 Sir) John Langdon Bonython,[8] who from 1893 to 1929 was the sole proprietor of The Advertiser. As well as being a talented newspaper editor, he also supported the movement towards the Federation of Australia. The Canberra suburb of Bonython, and the now abolished South Australian electoral division of Bonython, were named in his honour.

On Langdon Bonython's retirement, his son (from 1935 Sir) John Lavington Bonython,[9] also Mayor and later Lord Mayor of Adelaide, became editor.

The Herald and Weekly Times took a controlling stake in The Advertiser in 1929. Through the 20th century, The Advertiser was the morning broadsheet, and The News the afternoon tabloid. On the death of Sir Keith Murdoch in 1952, ownership of The News passed to his son Rupert, who subsequently established News Limited and News Corporation. In 1931 The Advertiser took over its ailing competitor, the South Australian Register and The Chronicle, its Saturday sister publication.

Following Sir Keith's death, and in response to suggestions of external influences from Victoria made by competing newspaper The Mail, the Chairman of The Advertiser's board published its policy in The Advertiser as follows:

'It is the same today as when the late Sir Langdon Bonython was in sole control.

It is based upon a profound pride and belief in South Australia, and the system of private enterprise which has made this State what it is.'[10]

On 24 October 1953 the company launched the Sunday Advertiser in direct competition to News Limited's Sunday Mail,[11] but failed to outreach its rival,[12] though no doubt affecting its profitability. It ceased publication five years or so later, after which the Sunday Mail advertised itself as a joint publication of Advertiser Newspapers and News Ltd., and incorporated many of the Sunday Advertiser regular features. The Sunday Advertiser had introduced (rather primitive by today's standards) color graphics on the comics page. This was dropped shortly after joint publication commenced.

When Murdoch acquired The Herald and Weekly Times in 1987, he also acquired the remaining 48.7% share of The Advertiser.[13] He sold The News in 1987. The News closed in 1992. He changed the format of The Advertiser from a broadsheet to a smaller tabloid format in November 1997.

Circulation

Both The Advertiser and the Sunday Mail are available for purchase throughout South Australia and some towns and regions in New South Wales, Victoria and the Northern Territory located near or adjacent to the South Australia state border such as Broken Hill, Mildura, Nhill and Alice Springs. According to The Advertiser's website, the newspaper is read by over 580,000 people each weekday, and by more than 740,000 people each Saturday.

The Advertisers's website, adelaidenow.com.au, was rated by third-party web analytics providers Alexa and SimilarWeb as, respectively, the 268th and 313rd most visited website in Australia, as of August 2015.[14][15] SimilarWeb rates the site as the 29th most visited news website in Australia, attracting almost 1.8 million visitors per month.[15][16]

Digitization

The National Library of Australia has digitized, by OCR, photographically archived copies of the following newspapers, accessible through Trove:

See also

References

  1. ↑ http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/gettingstarted/managing-your-subscription. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  2. 1 2 The South Australian Advertiser, published 1858–1889, National Library of Australia, digital newspaper library.
  3. ↑ C. M. Sinclair, 'Barrow, John Henry (1817–1874)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 3, Melbourne University Press, 1969, pp 104–105.
  4. ↑ "NLA – Australian Newspaper Plan – Australia's most significant 'at risk' newspapers". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 2008-08-24.
  5. 1 2 3 4 A. T. Saunders (19 July 1921). "A Newspaper's History". The Advertiser. South Australia. p. 10. Retrieved 31 May 2016 – via National Library of Australia.
  6. ↑ "Interesting People". The Mail. Adelaide: National Library of Australia. 1 June 1912. p. 2 Section: Second section. Retrieved 4 April 2013.
  7. ↑ "Dissolution of Partnership: Special Notice". The South Australian Advertiser. Adelaide: National Library of Australia. 2 December 1871. p. 2. Retrieved 4 April 2013.
  8. ↑ W. B. Pitcher, Bonython, Sir John Langdon (1848–1939), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 7, Melbourne University Press, 1979, pp 339–341
  9. ↑ W. B. Pitcher, Bonython, Sir John Lavington (1875–1960), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 7, Melbourne University Press, 1979, pp 341–342.
  10. ↑ "The Newspapers of South Australia" The Advertiser (1953-11-24). Retrieved 2014-01-02.
  11. ↑ Rod Kirkpatrick. "Press Timeline". Australian Newspaper History Group. Retrieved 1 June 2016.
  12. ↑ "Company Meeting". The Advertiser (Adelaide). 97, (29,942). South Australia. 1 October 1954. p. 8. Retrieved 1 June 2016 – via National Library of Australia.
  13. ↑ "News Corp moves to 'tie up a few loose ends'" The Canberra Times (1987-09-02). Retrieved 2014-01-02.
  14. ↑ "adelaidenow.com.au Site Overview". Alexa. Retrieved 2 August 2015.
  15. 1 2 "Adelaidenow.com.au Analytics". SimilarWeb. Retrieved 2 August 2015.
  16. ↑ "Top 50 sites in Australia for News And Media". SimilarWeb. Retrieved 2 August 2015.
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