It was acquired in 1965 by John H. Sengstacke, a major black publisher and owner of the Chicago Defender. He re-opened the paper in 1967 as the New Pittsburgh Courier, making it one of his four newspapers for the African American audience.
Creation and incorporation
The paper was founded by Edwin Nathaniel Harleston, who worked as a guard at the H. J. Heinz Company food packing plant in Pittsburgh. Harleston, a self-published poet, began printing the paper at his own expense in 1907. Generally about two pages, it was primarily a vehicle for Harleston's work.[1] He printed around ten copies, which he sold for five cents apiece.[5]
In 1909, Edward Penman, Hepburn Carter, Scott Wood Jr., and Harvey Tanner joined Harleston to run the paper, although they did not contribute financially. They named the paper as Pittsburgh Courier, after the Post and Courier of Charleston, South Carolina, Harleston's hometown. Harleston prepared the copy of the first issue of the Courier at his home, and Penman and Carter ordered five hundred copies from a printer in Philadelphia. The five men sold most of the copies of this issue throughout the Hill District on January 5, 1910. During this period, Courier issues were four pages in length.[6]
In early March 1910, Robert Lee Vann drew up incorporation papers for the Courier and began writing articles.[5] Although the Courier was being printed by the Union News Company in Pittsburgh to save money, by March Harleston began to run out of money for the paper. Through Vann's connections, the paper was able to attract some wealthy investors, including Cumberland Willis Posey Sr.[6] On May 10, 1910, the Pittsburgh Courier was formally incorporated, with Vann handling the legal means.[7] During the summer, the paper was expanded from four to eight pages, but struggled with circulation and financial solvency due to a small market and lack of interested advertisers.[7] In the fall of 1910, Harleston left the paper for financial and creative reasons.[8] Vann became editor, a position he would hold until his death in 1940.[1]
Editorship of Robert L. Vann
The Courier under Vann prominently featured Vann's work as a lawyer and public figure. In the early 1910s, a staff of four (Vann, a secretary, a sports editor, and an errand boy who also proof-read and handled mail) operated from a spare room above a funeral parlor in the Hill District.[9] But in 1914, the Courier moved to real offices on Fourth Avenue.[10] As editor, Vann wrote editorials encouraging readers to only patronize business that paid for advertisements in the Courier and ran contests to attempt to increase circulation.[11] In his Christmas editorial at the end of 1914, Vann wrote of the paper's intent to "abolish every vestige of Jim Crowism in Pittsburgh."[12]
Ira Lewis, editor and later president of the Pittsburgh Courier, back row, far left, at the Negro National League annual meeting held in Chicago on January 28, 1922
In the 1920s, Vann made efforts to improve the quality of the news included in the growing paper. In November 1925, the Courier joined the Associated Negro Press, the news collective of African American publications.[13] Under Vann, the "Local News" section of the Courier covered the social lives of the upper- and middle-class members of the Hill District. This included accounts of vacations, marriages, and parties of prominent families and the goings on of local groups, such as the Pittsburgh Frogs.[14] Vann stirred up controversy—and 10,000 new readers—by hiring George Schuyler in 1925, whose editorials and opinions made him known as the "black H. L. Mencken"[15] (who was a Courier subscriber).[16] In addition to Schuyler's contributions, the paper also ran special features by writers such as Joel Augustus Rogers and serialized novels, such as Walter Francis White's Fire in the Flint.[17] Sports was well covered by writers including Chester L. Washington, who began writing for the paper while still in high school in Pittsburgh, Wendell Smith,[18] and Cumberland Posey, son of one of the first investors.[19] The sports coverage focused on African American leagues, sometimes to the exclusion of white sporting events in Pittsburgh, including the 1927 World Series.[18]
The Courier also worked as a tool for social progress. Most significantly, the paper extensively covered the injustices on African Americans perpetrated by the Pullman Company and supported the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters.[20] Vann wrote to gain support for causes such as improved housing conditions in the Hill District, better education for black students, and equal employment and union opportunities.[21] However, Vann often used his Courier editorials to publicly fight with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and W. E. B. Du Bois over issues such as President Calvin Coolidge's grants of clemency to black soldiers involved in the Houston Riot[22] and Vann's allegations that James Weldon Johnson embezzled money for personal use from the NAACP and the Garland Fund.[23] This disharmony was resolved in 1929 by published apologies by Vann, Du Bois, and Johnson, and within the decade, Du Bois became a regular Courier contributor.[24] But in 1938, Vann's Courier ended up at odds with the NAACP once again. Vann, through national campaigns and contact with President Franklin D. Roosevelt pursued inclusion of African American units in the United States Armed Forces. Vann saw this as an achievable step on the path to integration of the military, but the NAACP leadership, primarily Walter White, publicly disagreed with this half-measure, despite the protests of Thurgood Marshall. As a result of the Courier's influence and Vann's political clout, New York Congressman Hamilton Fish successfully added an amendment prohibiting racial discrimination in selection and training of men drafted to the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940.[25]
In 1932, Vann officially put the Courier behind the party realignment of African Americans. He urged readers to vote for Democrats, writing, "My friends, go home and turn Lincoln's picture to the wall."[26]
In 1927, the Courier's New York City branch manager, Floyd J. Calvin, began broadcasting the weekly "Pittsburgh Courier Hour" on New York radio.[27] By 1928, the Courier's four editions (local, northern, eastern, and southern) were distributed in all 48 states and internationally, and by 1938, the paper was the largest American black weekly, with a circulation of 250,000.[14] Vann legitimized the Courier with a professional staff, national advertisements, a dedicated printing plant, and wide circulation.[28]
Later years and legacy
Following Vann's death in late 1940, close associate Ira Lewis filled his role as president and executive editor. The Courier maintained its upward trajectory, reaching an all-time circulation high of 357,000 in 1947.[29] When Lewis died in 1948, Vann's widow, Jessie Mathews Vann, assumed the role of president-treasurer.[30]
Upon the entrance of the United States into World War Two, the editors of the Pittsburgh Courier nominated African American journalist Frank E. Bolden to be an accredited war correspondent. Bolden was one of only two African American war correspondents accepted, and became a nationally recognized journalist, in addition to being city editor of the Courier from 1956 until 1962.[31]
In 1953, the Courier published sixteen regional editions, totaling 250,000 copies. This drop in circulation in just six years illustrates the Courier's decline.[32] The Courier's decline can be attributed in large part to advances during the Civil Rights Movement, because as white publications included more African American news, circulation steadily fell.[31][33] Also, the paper struggled without the financial expertise of the late Ira Lewis.[34]
P.L. Prattis, a career journalist, rose from city editor in 1936, to managing editor in 1948, to executive editor of the Pittsburgh Courier in 1956.[1] In 1947, Prattis was unanimously granted membership in the US Senate and House press galleries by the executive committee of the Periodical Correspondents Association. That year he was the first African American journalist permitted to enter the United States Congress via the Periodical Press Galleries of the United States Congress.[citation needed] He remained executive editor until 1965. In 1965, Prattis retired from the Courier after John H. Sengstacke purchased the ailing paper.[1]
Some prominent contributors to the Courier were Joel Augustus Rogers, who worked as a journalist for the Courier in the 1920s, and Sam Milai, editorial cartoonist for the Courier for 33 years. The Courier was the first to spot the talent of a young William Gardner Smith, who was hired by the Courier while still in high school. This was in 1943, some years before he gained attention as an expatriate novelist and journalist living in France.[35]Trezzvant Anderson covered the early years of the civil rights movement for the paper.[36]
Courier comic strips
The Pittsburgh Courier published comic strips, even syndicating some to other black newspapers. The first strip of note was Sunny Boy Sam, originally by Wilbert Holloway,[37] which launched in 1928 and continued past the demise of the Courier.[37] The Courier also published Your History, written by Joel Augustus Rogers and originally illustrated by George L. Lee. Patterned after the look of Robert Ripley's popular Believe It or Not cartoons, multiple vignettes in each cartoon episode recounted short items about African Americans from Rogers' research. Your History ran from November 10, 1934, to July 31, 1937. It returned in November 1940, illustrated by long-time Courier editorial cartoonist Sam Milai. In 1962 the strip was retitled Facts About The Negro, continuing for the rest of the Courier's run.[38]Jackie Ormes' Torchy, which ran in the Courier from May 1, 1937, to April 30, 1938, was the first syndicated strip by a black woman.[39]
Other notable strips published in the Courier included Jay Jackson's As Others See Us[40] and Jackie Ormes' Patty-Jo 'n' Ginger (1945–1956).[41]
From August 1950 to August 1954, the Courier partnered with the Smith-Mann Syndicate to publish a weekly color comics section called Carousel,[42] featuring a line-up of strips aimed at an African American audience. These strips included:
Chisholm Kid by Carl Pfeufer (August 19, 1950 – August 11, 1956) — also had a topper strip called Alan O'Dare from 1951 to 1954
Don Powers by Sam Milai (August 19, 1950 – November 1, 1958)
Funtime by Edo Anderson (1951–1954)
Guy Fortune by Edd Ashe (August 19, 1950 – October 22, 1955)
Kandy by A. C. Hollingsworth (1954–1955)
Lohar by Bill Brady (1950–October 18, 1958)
Mark Hunt by Michael Tam and/or Edd Ashe (c.1950–October 22, 1955)
Neil Knight of the Air by "Carl and Mac" (c.1950–October 22, 1955)
The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, also known as "the Trib", is the second-largest daily newspaper serving the Greater Pittsburgh metropolitan area of Western Pennsylvania. It transitioned to an all-digital format on December 1, 2016, but remains the second-largest daily in Pennsylvania, with nearly one million unique page views monthly. Founded on August 22, 1811, as the Greensburg Gazette and consolidated with several papers into the Greensburg Tribune-Review in 1889, the paper circulated only in the eastern suburban counties of Westmoreland and parts of Indiana and Fayette until May 1992, when it began serving all of the Greater Pittsburgh metropolitan area after a strike at the two Pittsburgh dailies, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and The Pittsburgh Press, deprived the city of a newspaper for several months.
George Samuel Schuyler was an American writer, journalist, and social commentator known for his outspoken political conservatism after repudiating his earlier advocacy of socialism.
The Pittsburgh Dispatch was a leading newspaper in Pittsburgh, operating from 1846 to 1923. After being enlarged by publisher Daniel O'Neill it was reportedly one of the largest and most prosperous newspapers in the United States. From 1880 to 1887 native of nearby Cochran's Mills, Nellie Bly worked for the Dispatch writing investigative articles on female factory workers, and later reported from Mexico as a foreign correspondent. The paper was politically independent and was particularly known for its in-depth court reporting.
The New Pittsburgh Courier is a weekly African-American newspaper based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. It is owned by Real Times.
The Michigan Chronicle is a weekly African-American newspaper based in Detroit, Michigan. It was founded in 1936 by John H. Sengstacke, editor of the Chicago Defender. Together with the Defender and a handful of other African-American newspapers, it is owned by Detroit-based Real Times Inc. Its headquarters are in the Real Times offices in Midtown Detroit.
African American newspapers are news publications in the United States serving African American communities. Samuel Cornish and John Brown Russwurm started the first African American periodical, Freedom's Journal, in 1827. During the Antebellum South, other African American newspapers sprang up, such as The North Star, founded in 1847 by Frederick Douglass.
Real Times Media LLC is the owner and publisher of the Chicago Defender, the largest and most influential African American weekly newspaper, as well as five other regional weeklies in the eastern and Midwestern United States. Its headquarters are in Midtown Detroit.
Jackie Ormes was an American cartoonist. She is known as the first African-American woman cartoonist and creator of the Torchy Brown comic strip and the Patty-Jo 'n' Ginger panel.
John Herman Henry Sengstacke was an American newspaper publisher and owner of the largest chain of African-American oriented newspapers in the United States. Sengstacke was also a civil rights activist and worked for a strong black press, founding the National Newspaper Publishers Association in 1940, to unify and strengthen African-American owned papers. Sengstacke served seven terms as president of the association, which by the early 21st century had 200 members.
Ahmed Samuel Milai, better known as Sam Milai, was an African American editorial and comic strip cartoonist who drew for the Pittsburgh Courier.
Robert Lee Vann was an African American newspaper publisher and editor. He was the publisher and editor of the Pittsburgh Courier from 1910 until his death.
Franklin Eugene Bolden, Jr., was an American journalist best known for his work as a war correspondent during World War II when he was one of only two accredited African American war correspondents.
Percival Leroy (P.L.) Prattis was an American journalist. He was the city editor of the Chicago Defender, the most influential African-American weekly newspaper in the U.S. at the beginning of World War I. Later, he spent 30 years at the Pittsburgh Courier, another influential black paper, rising up to become executive editor.
Hazel B. Garland was a journalist, columnist and newspaper editor. She was the first African-American woman to serve as editor-in-chief of a nationally circulated newspaper chain. Born into a farming family, she was the eldest of 16 children. Although a bright and capable student, she dropped out of high school at her fathers instigation, and spent time working as a maid in order to provide financial assistance to her family.
The Chicago Defender is a Chicago-based online African-American newspaper. It was founded in 1905 by Robert S. Abbott and was once considered the "most important" newspaper of its kind. Abbott's newspaper reported and campaigned against Jim Crow-era violence and urged black people in the American South to settle in the north in what became the Great Migration. Abbott worked out an informal distribution system with Pullman porters who surreptitiously took his paper by rail far beyond Chicago, especially to African American readers in the southern United States. Under his nephew and chosen successor, John H. Sengstacke, the paper dealt with racial segregation in the United States, especially in the U.S. military, during World War II. Copies of the paper were passed along in communities, and it is estimated that at its most successful, each copy was read by four to five people.
The Tri-State Defender is a weekly African-American newspaper serving Memphis, Tennessee, and the nearby areas of Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee. It bills itself as "The Mid-South's Best Alternative Newspaper". The Defender was founded in 1951 by John H. Sengstacke, owner of the Chicago Defender. In 2013, the paper was locally purchased from Real Times Media by the Tri-State Defender Board of Directors
Robert Abbott Sengstacke, also known as Bobby Sengstacke, was an African-American photojournalist during the Civil Rights Movement for the Chicago Defender in Chicago, Illinois. Sengstacke was well known for his famous portraits of Martin Luther King Jr. and other prominent civil rights leaders. Sengstacke inherited the family–owned Sengstacke Newspaper Company. After retiring from journalism in 2015, Sengstacke moved to Hammond, Indiana where he lived until his death due to a respiratory illness in 2017 at age 73.
John Wendell Smith was an American sportswriter and civil rights activist who was influential in the choice of Jackie Robinson's career as the first African American Major League Baseball player. Similarly, Smith was one of the first African American sport-writers to be a member of the Baseball Writers' Association of America, and was posthumously awarded the J. G. Taylor Spink Award by the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1993.
Jessie Vann was an African-American teacher and newspaper publisher. From 1940 to 1963 she was owner and publisher of the Pittsburgh Courier, a leading weekly African-American newspaper.
Frank L. Stanley Sr. was an American newspaper publisher and editor. Stanley co-founded and became sole publisher of The Louisville Defender, the city's leading Black newspaper that he led for 38 years. The Louisville Defender published in the face of regular threats and attacks, persevering under Stanley's belief that "racism is not insoluble." Stanley was general president of Alpha Phi Alpha and a civil rights activist. He drafted the resolution that led to desegregation of higher education in Kentucky, and chaired desegregation committees for the U.S. Secretary of War. Stanley was selected twice as a juror for the Pulitzer Prize Award committee.
1 2 Glasco, Laurence. "Double Burden: The Black Experience in Pittsburgh." (1989). Samuel P. Hays (ed.). City at the point: essays on the social history of Pittsburgh (Digitaled.). Pittsburgh, Pa: University of Pittsburgh Press. p.82. Retrieved October 10, 2013.
↑ Knoll, Erwin. "Smith-Mann to Launch Comics Supplement", Editor & Publisher (July 21, 1951). Archived at "Comic Book Experts - Can You Help Us?", Stripper's Guide (June 12, 2007).
Washburn, Patrick S. The African American Newspaper: Voice of Freedom (Northwestern University Press, 2006); covers 1827–1900; emphasis on the Chicago Defender and Pittsburgh Courier.
Whitaker, Mark. Smoketown: The Untold Story of the Other Great Black Renaissance. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2018. ISBN978-1-5011-2239-2. (Book includes substantive coverage of this newspaper)
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