Top of page

Notice
In observance of the Federal holiday on Monday, February 16, the Jefferson Building Great Hall and exhibitions will be open from 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. to guests with timed-entry passes. Reading rooms will be closed to researchers.
Chronicling America
National Endowment for the Humanities

Newspaper The Somerset Press (Somerset, Ohio) 1873-1977

View All Front Pages

About The Somerset Press (Somerset, Ohio) 1873-1977

Somerset, located in Perry County, Ohio, may no longer enjoy the title of “County Seat”, but it does have the distinction of being the home to the oldest Catholic church in Ohio, Saint Joseph’s, built in 1843. It was also home to a unique political point of view in the 1870s during a time of rebuilding for the United States.

In 1873, the Somerset Tribune uprooted and moved to New Lexington, the newly established seat of Perry County, leaving Somerset without a paper. Seeing a need to fill, M.G. Maine started the Somerset Press, which initially ran as an Independent paper, showing no partiality to any political party. The pages of the Press were filled with the standard local, national, and international news, but it also printed articles appealing to farmers, on such topics as livestock, market prices, and crop reports.

In the spring of 1877, Maine sold the Somerset Press to W.P. Magruder, who later that year decided to support the interests of the Greenback Party, then at the height of its popularity. In this agricultural region, Magruder could count on many who favored a system based on non-gold backed paper money that would boost market prices and allow farmers to pay off their loans faster. Aside from the political news, the Press continued to report on matters both domestic and foreign and printed a regular column titled “Topics of the Day” that covered major news from around the world in a concise, easy-to-read format.

Although the Greenback Party proved short-lived, the Somerset Press continued to thrive in the years that followed and went on to become the longest running newspaper in the town’s history, ultimately ending in 1977.

Provided By: Ohio History Connection, Columbus, OH

About this Newspaper

Title

  • The Somerset Press (Somerset, Ohio) 1873-1977

Dates of Publication

  • 1873-1977

Created / Published

  • Somerset, Ohio : [publisher not identified], -1977.

Headings

  • -  Somerset (Ohio)--Newspapers
  • -  Perry County (Ohio)--Newspapers
  • -  Ohio--Perry County
  • -  Ohio--Somerset
  • -  United States--Ohio--Perry--Somerset

Genre

  • Newspapers

Notes

  • -  Weekly
  • -  Began with Apr. 18, 1873 issue.
  • -  -v. 105, no. 22 (Sept. 8, 1977).
  • -  Archived issues are available in digital format from the Library of Congress Chronicling America online collection.
  • -  Description based on: Vol. 1, no. 9 (Jun. 13, 1873).
  • -  Perry County tribune (New Lexington, Ohio : 1941) 2332-4945 (DLC)sn 87075028 (OCoLC)16637869

Medium

  • volumes

Call Number/Physical Location

  • Newspaper

Digital Id

Library of Congress Control Number

  • sn85038088

OCLC Number

  • 11701574

ISSN Number

  • 2379-3112

Succeeding Titles

Additional Metadata Formats

Availability

Rights & Access

The Library of Congress believes that the newspapers in Chronicling America are in the public domain or have no known copyright restrictions. Newspapers published in the United States more than 95 years ago are in the public domain in their entirety. Any newspapers in Chronicling America that were published less than 95 years ago are also believed to be in the public domain, but may contain some copyrighted third party materials. Researchers using newspapers published less than 95 years ago should be alert for modern content (for example, registered and renewed for copyright and published with notice) that may be copyrighted. Responsibility for making an independent legal assessment of an item and securing any necessary permissions ultimately rests with persons desiring to use the item.

The NEH awardee responsible for producing each digital object is presented in the Chronicling America page display, below the page image – e.g. Image produced by the Library of Congress. For more information on current NDNP awardees, see https://www.loc.gov/ndnp/listawardees.html.

For more information on Library of Congress policies and disclaimers regarding rights and reproductions, see https://www.loc.gov/homepage/legal.html

Cite This Item

Citations are generated automatically from bibliographic data as a convenience, and may not be complete or accurate.

Chicago citation style:

The Somerset Press Somerset, Ohio -1977. (Somerset, OH), Jan. 1 1873. https://www.loc.gov/item/sn85038088/.

APA citation style:

(1873, January 1) The Somerset Press Somerset, Ohio -1977. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/sn85038088/.

MLA citation style:

The Somerset Press Somerset, Ohio -1977. (Somerset, OH) 1 Jan. 1873. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/item/sn85038088/.