| Type | African-American weekly |
|---|---|
| Owner(s) | Lee Publishing Company |
| Founder(s) | William H. Lee Gino Gladden John W. Cole |
| Publisher | Larry Lee |
| Editor-in-chief | Stephen Magagnini |
| Managing editor | Angelica Obioha |
| General manager | Whitfield Wilma |
| Founded | November 22, 1962 |
| Language | English |
| Headquarters | Sacramento, California |
| ISSN | 0036-2212 |
| Website | sacobserver |
The Sacramento Observer is an African-American-owned weekly newspaper in Sacramento, California. It serves the African-American community throughout the Sacramento Metropolitan Area.
In 1942, Rev. John T. Muse founded The Sacramento Outlook, a community newspaper serving the black community in Oak Park. Muse, a Baptist minster, published the paper for 20 years. Upon retiring, he sold it to a group of six business men including William Hanford Lee. At that time the paper was mailed weekly to 300 subscribers. [1] The Outlook was the Capital city's first black newspaper. After the sale the paper was rebranded as The Sacramento Observer on Thanksgiving day in November 1962. [2]
Lee, who founded the Men's Civic League which purchased the paper, managed the Observer with two others, [2] Eugene "Geno" Gladden and John W. Cole. The three bought the paper and expanded it into a broadsheet over frustration from the lack of coverage on the local black community from The Sacramento Bee and The Sacramento Union. [3] Lee was 26 when he became part-owner. [3] In 1965, he assumed the newspaper’s debt from his two partners and the role of publisher. [4] The paper wasn't profitable for years and in 1968 lost $60,000. Lee sold his thriving real estate business in an attempt to salvage the paper. [3]
Lee was an advocate for black journalists in Sacramento. He persuade both The Sacramento Bee and the Stockton Record to hire their first black reporters, both Observer alumni. [4] In the late 1960s, the Capitol Correspondents Association refused to grant membership to journalists from the Observer because the newspaper was a weekly. The association later relented, and granted the Observer access to cover the California State Capitol in 1973. [4]
Lee became sole-owner when one partner died and another was bought out. By the paper's 10th anniversary, the Sacramento Observer had won 50 awards and boasted a circulation of 22,500. [2] A decade later the Observer had 42,000 subscribers, a staff of 35 and had won the John B. Russwurm Award from National Newspaper Publishers Association. [3] In 2001, the paper launched it's website. [4] Lee ran the Observer for decades with his wife Katheryn C. Lee. By 2003, the paper had won 500 local and national awards, and the Russwurm Award, the highest honor in African American journalism, six times. [5] Lee over saw the editorial-side while his wife over saw the finances. In 2013, Katheryn C. Lee died at age 77. [6] In 2019, William Hanford Lee died. He was 83. [7] At that time his youngest son Larry Lee took over the Observer. In 2023, the paper won its seventh Russwurm Award. [8]