The Seward Gateway Archive

The Seward Gateway served citizens of Seward as a news fixture for nearly 40 years. Readers may encounter some difficulty in parsing the paper's many changes in name and frequency, especially because the earliest edition of the Seward Gateway, which begat the Seward Weekly Gateway, ran concurrent to the Daily Gateway and, later, the Seward Daily Gateway.

Purchased by Frank and John Ballantine and published weekly by Editor Randall Kemp starting in August of 1904 (a definitive date is unclear), the first iteration of the Seward Gateway lasted one year before changing its name to the Seward Weekly Gateway in 1905. Its publication coincided with the first arrival of the Alaska Central Railroad at Seward, and its writing staff included a number of veteran journalists from Alaska papers throughout the territory. By the August 14, 1914 issue, however, Kemp changed the paper's name to the Seward Gateway and chose to publish weekly and daily issues concurrently under the same title.

The 1913 edition of the Seward Gateway, edited by E. O. Sawyer, started as a continuation of the Seward Daily Gateway. Bernie Stone, originally from New Zealand, published and edited the Seward Gateway in 1914. The February 1, 1917 issue absorbed the Alaska Evening Post and became the Seward Gateway and the Alaska Evening Post, which lasted until 1918 and later changed its name to the Seward Gateway Daily Edition and the Alaska Weekly Post.

A violent rainstorm struck Seward in 1917, flooded the newsroom, and washed away the home of Sawyer, who left Alaska and appointed Elmer Friend as the paper's editor. On November 29, 1920, editors F. B. Camp, Harry G. Steel, A. G. Rucher, and Hal B. Selby took over the paper and renamed it the Seward Gateway. After Selby and Ernest Forrest Jessen joined forces with the paper, it became known as the Seward Daily Gateway on February 10, 1923, and ran until September 21, 1933. Jessen and L. Busey then resurrected the Seward Gateway as a continuation of the Seward Daily Gateway and championed social causes. Jessen wore many hats as reporter, editor, and business and circulation manager until his departure for Fairbanks in 1938. Busey took over and published the paper weekly until November 19, 1941.