Maysville Weekly Bulletin Archive

Maysville’s storied Democratic newspaper, the Bulletin, was founded by James J. Ross and George S. Rosser in 1862. First known as the Dollar Weekly Bulletin, in two short years the paper changed its name to the Maysville Weekly Bulletin (it appeared simply as the Bulletin for one week in October 1864 before suspending publication until January 25, 1865). By 1866, the paper was known as the Maysville Bulletin

In 1869, Ross and Rosser had taken a man named Welch into their publishing fold, but the partnership was short lived as the original two were sole publishers again by 1870. When Ross died in 1880, Rosser took on M.J. McCarthy as his publishing and editing partner. The following year, Rosser and McCarthy decided to launch a daily paper, which they called the Daily Evening Bulletin. They also sold the weekly Maysville Bulletin. The Daily Evening Bulletin appeared every day except Sunday and, like its predecessors, reported on both state and national activities of the Democratic Party in addition to covering local society and national news. Rosser and McCarthy could not seem to settle on a permanent title for the daily, and, in 1882, they changed its name to the Evening Bulletin, before reverting one year later to the Daily Evening Bulletin. In 1887, the paper was christened the Evening Bulletin, a title which it retained for the next 18 years.

The Evening Bulletin enjoyed a healthy rivalry with Maysville’s best known Republican paper, the Daily Public Ledger. The two often commented on each other’s editorials and, for many years, kept a running commentary between them. Little did either paper know how their paths would eventually converge. Rosser and McCarthy had served jointly as publishers and editors of the Bulletin, but, in 1898, as Rosser’s health declined, Millard F. Marsh took over as editor. In 1905, both Marsh and Rosser died. The remaining owner, McCarthy, immediately partnered with John Aultmeyer to manage the newspaper, which they now decided to call the Daily Bulletin. Although it remained a daily, the Bulletin assumed the volume numbering of the weekly Maysville Bulletin that had appeared more than 20 years earlier.

In 1936, the Democratic Daily Bulletin was sold to rival, Daily Independent which survived until 1968. At that time, the Daily Independent and Public Ledger, the successor of the Bulletin’s old Republican rival Daily Public Ledger, were bought by the Gadsden (Alabama) Times Publishing Company and joined together to form the Public Ledger the Daily Independent. In 1969, the title was changed to the Ledger-Independent, a paper still in publication today (http://www.maysville-online.com).