Judsonia Weekly Advance Archive

Judsonia is in White County, Arkansas, along the lower Little Red River, in the northeast central region of the state. The southern half of modern Judsonia was originally a separate town called Prospect Bluff, which was situated the first highland bank on the northern side of the river. In 1870 the name Judsonia first appeared, and the town was incorporated ten days after Prospect Bluff in 1872. In 1874 the two towns chose to merge into one. That same year, the first strawberries were harvested, and they quickly became the dominant cash crop.

Edgar Curtis Kinney founded the Judsonia Advance in 1878. It began as an 8-page paper issued every Wednesday. Originally listed as politically neutral, the Advance changed its political affiliation multiple times during its run. The Advance advertised as a newspaper devoted to religious, educational, literary, and local matters and its motto was "Overcome prejudice. Let free thought and free speech be encouraged."

In 1886, Kinney sold the paper to Berton W. Briggs. Berton and his brother Flavel G. Briggs ran the Advance as a politically independent newspaper under their publishing group, the Briggs Brothers. They published the paper until 1889, at which time they sold it back to Kinney. Kinney ran the paper variously as Republican and independent.

Edgar Kinney was raised in New York and worked for the circus, traveling around the United States before settling in Arkansas. After moving to Arkansas, Kinney was heavily involved in the Arkansas State Horticultural Society and fruit farming, as was popular in Judsonia. He was an active Republican and president of the first Republican Convention held in White County. He also served as mayor of Judsonia. In the late 1800s he was the president of the Arkansas Press Association. One of his sons, Gilbert Earle Kinney, learned the newspaper trade from him and took over the Judsonia Advance in 1902. Around this time, the Advance's title changed officially to the Judsonia Weekly Advance.

Gilbert Kinney ran the Weekly Advance as a Republican paper until 1908. In 1909, O. R. Rich bought the paper and continued running it with a Republican perspective until 1914. Ralph C. Mann, Sr. owned the paper in 1915 and ran it as a Democratic paper until 1920. After purchasing the paper, Mann installed new printing machinery, including a cylinder press and linotype machine, and was able to increase his subscribers by the hundreds. In 1921, Mann changed the Weekly Advance to an independent affiliation, and in 1922 began publishing on Thursdays instead of Wednesdays. Mann's final change was a major one: he combined the Advance with The Bald Knob Eagle (1921-1922) to form the White County Record, published by the Mann Printing Company. The White County Record continued to circulate into the 21^st century.