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Chronicling America
National Endowment for the Humanities

Newspaper The Sauk Centre Herald (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-Current

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About The Sauk Centre Herald (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-Current

An Independent Republican paper, the Sauk Centre Herald serves the predominantly agricultural communities of northwestern Stearns County, Minnesota, located in the west central area of the state. In 1879, Charles F. Hendryx purchased The Sauk Centre Herald from Joseph H. Simonton, who founded the paper in 1867. The following year, Hendryx acquired another local area paper, the Melrose Record, and merged the two to form The Sauk Centre Herald and Melrose Record. With its April 29, 1886 issue, the paper reverted to the name Sauk Centre Herald.

Published weekly on Thursdays, The Sauk Centre Herald was a four-page, eight-column newspaper from 1886 to 1894, when it changed format to five columns and eight pages, eventually adding a sixth column per page in 1898. This remained the paper’s configuration until the late 1920s, when it increased in size to 12 pages and seven columns. The paper’s circulation in 1886 was 900; by 1925, that number had increased to 2,750. As of 2021, The Sauk Centre Herald is still in publication.

By the time he became the editor and publisher of The Sauk Centre Herald, Charles F. Hendryx was already a seasoned newspaper veteran, having worked for many years in Cooperstown, New York, at The Otsego Republican, where his father, James I. Hendryx, was the publisher. Charles had also held numerous editorial positions at The Minneapolis Tribune. Among the paper’s staff during Hendryx’s tenure was a teenaged Sinclair Lewis, a Sauk Centre native who later went on to a distinguished career as a bestselling novelist and playwright, and in 1930 became the first American to win the Nobel Prize for literature. Describing his time at the paper, Lewis later wrote, “I had to do everything: watch arrivals and departures at the Great Northern Depot, set type, run a hand press for posters, and sweep the floor – the only part of my profession at which I was very good. Charles Hendryx, the editor, father of James Hendryx, the novelist, had hired me at nothing per week. After a month he fired me, because I wasn’t worth what I was getting.” Two articles attributed to Lewis – “Forth into the World” and “Odds and Ends” – were published on page one of the paper’s June 5, 1902 issue. Although these articles did not include a by-line, they are among the earliest of Lewis’s published works.

Provided By: Minnesota Historical Society; Saint Paul, MN

About this Newspaper

Title

  • The Sauk Centre Herald (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-Current

Dates of Publication

  • 1886-current

Created / Published

  • Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn. : Charles F. Hendryx, 1886-

Headings

  • -  Sauk Centre (Minn.)--Newspapers
  • -  Stearns County (Minn.)--Newspapers
  • -  Minnesota--Stearns County
  • -  Minnesota--Sauk Centre
  • -  United States--Minnesota--Stearns--Sauk Centre

Genre

  • Periodicals
  • Newspapers

Notes

  • -  Vol. 19, no. 48 (Apr. 29, 1886)-
  • -  Available on microfilm from the Minnesota Historical Society.
  • -  Archived issues are available in digital format from the Library of Congress Chronicling America online collection.

Medium

  • v.

Call Number/Physical Location

  • Newspaper

Digital Id

Library of Congress Control Number

  • sn89064489

OCLC Number

  • 20545224

ISSN Number

  • 2831-980x

Preceding 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.

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Cite This Item

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

Chicago citation style:

The Sauk Centre Herald Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn. -Current. (Sauk Centre, MN), Jan. 1 1886. https://www.loc.gov/item/sn89064489/.

APA citation style:

(1886, January 1) The Sauk Centre Herald Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn. -Current. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/sn89064489/.

MLA citation style:

The Sauk Centre Herald Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn. -Current. (Sauk Centre, MN) 1 Jan. 1886. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/item/sn89064489/.