The Waxahachie Daily Light from Waxahachie, Texas • Page 9

Sunday, October 8, 1972 THE WAXAHACHIE DAILY LIGHT FALL FABRIC SALE POLYESTER DOUBLEKNIT 2 3 COLOR YARN DYED JACQUARDS NEW GROUP FOR THIS SALE Fall Fashion Colors, Ideal for Pants, Suits, Dresses Pant Suits, Etc. 60 REGULAR 5 98 fl fl Yard FABRIC CLEARANCE Selections of checks, flocks, seersuckers canvas cloth, poplin, etc 45 wide REDUCED 2 1 .00 ACRILAN SHAG Luxurious cashmere feel will be ideal for new fall coats, jackets, long skirts, etc. Wear Dated by Monsanto. Machine washable 20 REDUCED OFF SPORTSWEAR CO-ORDINATES Permanent Press Blend of Cotton and Avril Rayon 45 wide. REGULAR 1 19 Yard FLORAL QUILTS This Satin Jersey Quilted Fabric Is Perfect For Long Skirts For Party and Holiday Wear Bright color combinations.

45 REGULAR 3.98 Yard Balloons Fill The Air Balloons filled the air Friday night before ick off time as the WHS I ndians get ready to smash through the barrier held by a Cherokee Charmer manager on the left and a cheerleader on the right. The other cheerleaders along with Kyle Tullock, Indian mascot, lead the WHS gridders to the WHS bench. Waxahachie did slay Dragons to the tune 10 7 (Staff Photo.) Brownwood paper, became co- publisher of the Daily light. In the spring of 1969, the Daily Light purchased the building adjacent to its own and installed phototypesetting equipment, a roll-filrn processing camera, film essor and a twelve- gauge. four-color Goss Community Press to replace the old eight-pagt Goss flatbed press with hot metal production The first offset edition was published July 1, 1969, and the first four-color edition, July 4, 1969.

During this time the Daily Light was printing 13 other papers in tlie Dallas area, which required two shifts and around- the-clock operation. These papers included the County and South Dallas Weeklies In 1970 the Daily Light discontinued ail outside printing except for Waxahachie and Red Oak high school papers, the Southwestern Assemblies of God College paper, the Italy weekly and the Presbyterian Homes publication. By the end of 1971, the Daily Light had doubled in volume income from advertising, classified and circulation since it became a division of CHACO CRACO, Int includes Waxahachie Daily Light, Port I-iVaca Wave. Calhoun County Times, Brownwood Bulletin. Other corporations controlled by Mr Woodson publish the Stephenville Daily Empire and the Miami Okla.i Herald The Daily Light in the past 10 years won 54 regional, state and national awards for editorial excellence, and community service reaching its greatest editorial achievement in June, 1962, when it was judged the outstanding daily newspaper in towns of less titan 15,000 by the Texas Press Assn Its assistant publisher was elected president of the Texas Press Assn, at the same con vention and in September, 1972, lie was appointed to the advisory board of the University of Texas School of Communications Somt 30 Waxahac hie families earn their living at the Waxahachie daily newspaper.

In new plant equipment alone, the firm represented an investment of some $250,000, when the paper pioneered offset printing in this area for newspapers. Incoming Mail Waxahachie will have bettei incoming mail service, it was disclosed Saturday by Postmaster Roy Almond It was disclosed that the bulk of Waxahachie mail ill leave Dallas at 1 a.m. instead of the 11 Time Changed pm hour which was in effect until Saturday Mr Almond noted this extra time will give the clerks in Dallas more time to prepare the mail for hie The mail will arrive at 3 a m. WHS Student Traces Origin Of Waxahachie Daily Light Suzanne Pannill, Waxahachie High School freshman and daughter of Mr. and Mrs.

Jesse Pannill, told the story of tlx- Waxahachie Daily Light this week to Waxahachie High School Junior Historians. She traced the origin of Ellis County journalism back to the first county paper, the Waxahachie Argus, started in 1867 by Frank Templeton. Sneed purchased the Argus in 1870 and renamed it tlie Democrat and sold it a year later to and J. Dale bought the paper in 1873, but it burned the same year, ending the first newspaper in Ellis County. The Waxahachie Enterprise was established by J.

S. Haynes in 1875, but it soon passed to B. Carpenter with Haynes remaining as editor The Enterprise was sold to C. R. Gibson and A McMillan in 1876, with Carpenter becoming owner in 1877 In 1880 the little paper was sold to E'.

Yeager and EL Senter, and tins partnership lasted until 1881, when Senter sold his interest to Yeager Yeager remained as the publisher until his death in 1890, when half interest was sold to J. Clark, with tlx- remaining fialf in the hands of Mrs Yeager The North Texas Herald was brought to this area in 1875 by Ledwith, who soon consolidated the paper with tlx- Enterprise After Ledwith death, his interest as sold to A McMillan, with Gibson also getting an interest Several of the founding fathers of Waxahachie and Kills County served as editors of the old Enterprise Husbands. 0 E', Dunlap, E', Huckabee, the Rev Givens, John King and S. Hardy The Enterprise was at its peak, had 6,000 subscribers and the Enterprise Publishing Co lasted far longer than any of tin- other early newspapers, (-easing publication during tlx- 1920s wlx-n the Waxahachie Daily Light became the predominant newspaper Politically the Enterprise was always Democratic Meanwhile the railroad had come to Waxahachie in 1880 and with it the man who established the Mirror EL Huckabee was a young newspaperman from Bryan, who thought that a bustling t(rwn like Waxahachie needed two newspapers instead of one He issued the first copy of the Mirror on Jan 5, 1981 The Mirror was ated in tin- old Opera House 1 which is now Moore Hardware Store 1 Tlx- Mirror began as a weekly, run off laboriously on a hand- operated press Huckabee persuaded Gibson of tin Enterprise to help him get the off to a good start, and soon the little sheet had ob tained a high rank among the newspapers of the state Huckabee sold the paper to Thomas .1 Middleton in April, 1887, and Mr Middleton remained as editor and publisher until the paper discontinued publication some years later A fire destroyed the Baumgartner building, in which the Mirror was published, on the night of May 21, 1888 Tin- previous ly we 11-equipped office was completely destroyed nothing being saved but the books and the mailing list. However, tin- fire kept only one issue off tin- stands A new outfit was quickly purchased, and tin- paper enlarged its scope to become the ELI lis County Mirror Writers of the tunes spoke of tin- Mirror as speaking up for whatever would build up its town and county, and to that end has always been the steadfast friend of public schools and tin- public school system as a The Mirror also advocated better roads and tilings tliat will benefit the laboring classes while it develops tin- The mid-1880s saw the advent of the third Waxahachie publishing firm.

The EUlis County Telegraph was begun in the summer of 1885, when Givens, T. Campbell and B. Criddle bought out a large job office and discovered that, with a small addition to their stock of material, they could easily print a weekly paper The Telegraph became the mouthpiece of the up-and-coming Alliance, a movement OCTOBER IS that other newspapers of the time were slow to recognize. With the demise of the Rural Citizen, published at Jacksboro, the leaders of the movement gave the Telegraph their undivided support. The Telegraph then soon built up a wide circulation in the state.

Mr. Campbell, who had been business manager of the Telegraph, sold his interest to Giveas and ('riddle after a few months and withdrew Givens then became editor and business manager arid the paper flourished. Criddle became tied up in other business interests, which restricted him from taking an active part in the conduct of the paper, and one fall sold his interest to a young man named Bishop Mr Bishop was a very practical man who soon took charge of the office work, superintending the job and new spaper departments Prohibition was an important issue in the summer of 1887, and the Telegraph backed it strongly, but the cause suffered a signal defeat, which caused a large falling-off in Telegraph patronage However, the paper soon recouped its losses and became stronger than before In the fall of 1887, the proprietors decided to sell the paper to Messrs McMillan, Kimble and Husbands The name of tlx paper was changed to the Waxahachie Democrat and Mr Givens exchanged the newspaper business for tlx- superintendency of the public schools in ELllis County Mr Bishop moved to Pittsburg Kan The men who published tlx- early newspapers of County were easily as fascinating as the papers they publislx-d A Kimble fiad worked his way from to manager He had tx-en foreman of the Enterprise and Daily Light for seven years and managed the job department an equal number of years After this he became a traveling correspondent and solicitor for both the Enterprise and Daily Light He finally became general collector of tlx- Enterprise Publishing Co E'rom the beginning of his newspaper work 1879. Mr Kimble fiad observed tlx- growth of tlx Enterprise Publishing Co from a fledgling concern to one of the most modern publishing firms anywhere in the state Yeager was know as a man of splendid educ ation, a Christian, game, and not afraid to put his thoughts in print He was also a prohibitionist a wet town During his years as owner of tlie paper, there was a saloon on every corner in Waxahachie and some in tlx middle of the block This brought about the heavy flow of red liquor, in turn, bringing about various riots and killings Mr Yeager spared no orx- feelings in writing about the sliameful affairs and mentioned tfie ring leaders by name One of the more outspoken editors of the paper was Charles Gibson Familiarly known as Charlie," lx- was an Odd Eel low for 50 years and a for mer Speaker of the- House of Representatives of Texas His editorials discussed life here when land sold for $2 50 an acre and exulted when a Republican governor, EL Davis, lost to Richard Coke after an obnoxious reign in Reconstruction Days Uncle'' newspaper motto was Uphold tiie Right Denounce the Wrong" One of the things Charlie considered wrong was the trouble with tlx- Indians Wlx-n he received a special dispatch from San Antonio revealing that "The Lone a Kiowa Chief, was bringing a large band of Indians to Texas from Oklahoma to avenge the death of his son, Waxahachians were the first to know tlx- details of the affair. One of his editorials declared that Negroes were holding offices in the government of Mississippi, although not half of them have gone as far as baker (This must have been a reference to the Blue-Back Speller when, if a person could spell certain words, he was considered 1 The waxahachie Daily Light, now the only paper published in Waxahachie was begun in 1891 Around the turn of the century, the Daily Light had to compete with Weekly Ellis County and Daily but by 1917 only the Daily Light and the Enterprise remained.

However, the most prosperous paper was tlie one published by the (xid E'ellows, with a circulation of 8.000. By 1917, the Daily Light was able to employ from six to eight people, contained six to eight pages, and had a capital stock of $36,000 The early days of the Waxahachie Daily Light did produce one amusing story. One night in 1900, when the pajx-r was located on the west side of College Street, a burglar entered through a rear indow As he dropped from the window he fell into an open ink barrel and was unable to get out Unable to free himself, he had to wait until the town night watchman arrived to get help After being retrieved from the sticky, black mess, he was placed in jail. E'rom its location on College Street, the Daily Light moved to a building adjacent to the- old City Hall, occupying both floors. The paper could now boast of liaving a plant which included a business office, editorial rooms, a commercial printing department, a pressroom with an elevator and the first Linotype, a typesetting machine, in town Construction of a brand new home for tlx Daily Light was begun on Oct 3, 1925, at West Franklin and Elm Streets The officers of the paper at that time were Gammon, president Dr (' A Blind, vice president, Ray, secretary; A Ownby, managing editor; Floyd Casebolt, acting managing editor.

Gerx- Cooper, city editor. Lester Jordan (currently sports information director for Southern Methodist University), editor; ELI McE'lroy, general manager; and Herbert Herring, advertising manager fortunately, the new building was liard to ventilate and too expensive; so the beginning of tlie Depression saw the Daily Light move to its location at 215 South College Street. Floyd and Faye Casebolt, now editors of the Ennis Daily News, Rob McCrady and baseball manager Paul Richards published the paper during World War II In 1948, they started looking for a buyer for the paper, and ELllis County- Auditor Bill Davis a pressman at paper during the 1920s when he lost several fingers running tlx- old flatbed press) became interested. He contacted an old friend, the late C. Woodson, who had started a string of ELllis County newspapers during the 1920s Mr Woodson, president of Southwestern Dailies, at the time, bought tlie paper and made Mr Davis the resident publisher, assisted by Mr wife, Ruth, who ran the office and looked after the day- to-day operation of the paper Mr company, at that time, also included the Brownwood Bulletin, I mesa Reporter, Brownfield News- Herald and the Miami News- Record, later adding the Del Rio News-Herald, Alice EL ho and the Port LaVaca Wave Ken who had been editor of the Alice was hired as editor of the Daily Light on Sept 1, 1953, and the paper prospered fairly well until the drouth of the late 1950s caused hardships for the Daily Light as well as the people of the region Craig Woodson, son, purchased the paper from his father in 1962 E'rom this time, the Daily Light became .1 part of eraeo, Inc owned by Craig Woixlson and consisting of papers lx- liad bought from his father One June 1, 1962, Donald L.

Cop- jx-dge. former editor of the.