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Weekly Record by M. A. Parry

Parry, M. A. 1963. The History of Loleta. M.A. thesis, Arcata, Humboldt State College, pp.178-182.

Loleta had two newspapers. Miles A. Simpson published the first issue of the Weekly Record on the first Friday in January, 1897. It was a four page, four column publication. This was the publisher's second venture in the publishing field. Simpson was raised in Ferndale and in August, 1896, had begun the publication of a weekly campaign paper which he called the Silver Dollar. He was an ardent advocate of the free coinage of silver and William Jennings Bryan, and started his paper for the purpose of campaigning for both. Shortly after the general election in November, he announced that he would move to Loleta and start a paper in that town. He rented one of the Rasmussen dwellings on Main Street (the second house north of Kearney) and it became his home and printshop.

In March, three months after the Weekly Record was founded, the Rohnerville Herald and the Weekly Record were consolidated and published as a single newspaper. This combination was not of long duration, however, for in May, the Herald suspended operations and its physical assets were packed and stored pending their sale. The Weekly Record office was closed for two weeks and publication was resumed late in May.

In early 1898, Simpson bought the machinery and other equipment of the defunct Rohnerville Herald, and established his printing plant in the upper half of the Healy Building. In August that year the print shop was moved to the Loleta Hotel building. At the beginning of the third year (January, 1899) Simpson purchased from the Matthews brothers of Ferndale the job printing press formerly in use in the Rohnerville Herald office. He also bought a lot next to the lumber yard, on the northwest corner of Spring Street and Loleta Avenue, and had a building erected at the west end of the lot in which he relocated his print shop. He advertised that he was prepared to do all kinds of job work at Loleta. In August, Miles sold a half interest in the Weekly Record to August Tappendorff and they formed a partnership to run the paper.

Simpson spent most of the last half of 1899 in bed because of sickness and at the beginning of the paper's fourth year (1900), sold his half interest in the paper to his partner. Tappendorff then employed Charles Whitten as an assistant and in August, leased the print shop to the new employee with the understanding that publication of the Record would continue. Whitten's lease expired in February, 1901, and Tappendorff again assumed control of the paper. He suspended publication a year later (in March, 1902), shortly after G.A. Jasper began publishing the Humboldt Beacon. The Record office remained closed for several months, publication of the paper resuming in June. After a few issues, however, the shop was closed for good and the equipment moved to Eureka. With a partner, D.L. Loofbouroow, Tappendorff opened a job printing shop at the county seat.

The Humboldt Beacon (presently in Fortuna) was founded by Reverend Gustavus A. Jasper, pastor of the, then, Loleta Congregational Church. He started out by buying the Ferndale Independent newspaper and job printing outfit. To house his equipment he bought A.J. Bulmer's old butcher shop which was located on the northwest corner of Market and Franklin streets. He moved it down town and put it on the northwest corner of Market and Main streets, alongside of what was then known as the Johnson building. The first issue of the paper was printed on the first Friday in March, 1902, on the seventh day of the month. The last issue before the paper was moved to Fortuna was printed on the last Friday in May of the same year.

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