Sioux City Register Archive

The first newspaper in Woodbury County was the Sioux City Iowa Eagle, established by Seth W. Swiggett in 1857. Swiggett proclaimed that the Eagle would be an "independent local journal devoted to the interests of the great North West, particularly of Iowa." While Iowa was the focus, the Eagle also included local news from Minnesota, Nebraska, and Kansas. After three years of publication, the Eagle was absorbed by the Sioux City Register in 1860.

The Register began as the Western Independent, established by Francis M. Ziebach and A.S. Cummings in Sergeant Bluff in 1857. This publication ran for less than a year before Ziebach relocated the office to Sioux City and changed the title to the Sioux City Register in July 1858. The following year, William Freney joined the paper as the associate editor. As the official paper of Woodbury County, the Register focused on local news, events, and notices of interest to residents of Sioux City and the surrounding area. Due to its location in northwestern Iowa, the Register also featured news of the newly organized Dakota Territory and reported on Native American affairs.

In 1861, Ziebach left Sioux City for the town of Yankton in the Dakota Territory, where he established the Weekly Dakotian. Freney was a partner in this business as well, remaining in Sioux City to oversee the Register while Ziebach edited and published the paper in Yankton. By 1863, Ziebach sold the Weekly Dakotian to George W. Kingsbury, transferred his interest in the Sioux City Register to Freney, and he moved to Dubuque, Iowa.

Ziebach returned to Sioux City in 1868, where he served for two terms as mayor and was appointed register of the United States land office located there. In 1870, he moved back to Yankton, continued his political career, and he remained there for the rest of his life. His long residence and public service in Yankton led to the naming of Ziebach County, South Dakota in his honor in 1911.

Freney remained the sole editor and proprietor of the Sioux City Register through the rest of its existence. The Register had been a Democratic paper since its establishment, and it remained so under Freney's leadership. In the years preceding the Civil War, the Register ran editorials defending southern states' right to continue the practice of slavery, supporting the Fugitive Slave Act, and criticizing the Lincoln administration. During the war, regular columns were devoted to war news and telegraph reports from across the country. The Register continued for a few more years after the end of the war before ceasing publication in 1871.