Pioneer and Democrat (Olympia, Wash. Territory [Wash.])
Historic newspapers carry the language, views and graphic reporting of their time, including racist content. They are shown to teen and adult profiles.
371 issues from 1854 to 1861, published in Olympia, Washington, digitised for Chronicling America.
The Columbian was the first regular newspaper published in what would become Washington Territory. Residents of Olympia were eager to have a newspaper published in their town and convinced Thomas Jefferson Dryer, publisher of the Oregonian, to start a venture in the city. Dryer sent James W. Wiley and Thornton Fleming McElroy to Olympia with an old Ramage press to start the paper. Dryer’s ownership of the paper was kept secret, Wiley and McElroy claiming full control over its content and denouncing rumors of any “controlling interest.” The press itself already had a notable history, previously used to publish government proclamations in Mexico in the 1830s, several newspapers in San Francisco in the 1840s, and the first issue of the Oregonian in 1850. It would later continue north to print Seattle’s first newspaper, the Seattle Gazette, in 1863.
The first issue of the Columbian emerged on September 11, 1852. In it, Wiley and McElroy announced their intention to run a paper “neutral in politics” and “devoted to the interests of Oregon, and the territory north of the Columbia River in particular.” The Columbian advocated strongly for the creation of a new territory north of the Columbia and took its name from this proposed new territory. Wiley left the paper in March 1853, after Congress passed an act to split Washington Territory from Oregon, but before the news reached Olympia. In September McElroy announced his departure from the paper, and in December Dryer sold it to…
- Genres
- News
- Published in
- Olympia, Washington, United States
- Language
- English
- Collection
- Chronicling America
- Licence or status
- None stated by the archive
- Rights
- 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.
- Credit
- Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities
- Who can read it
- Teens profiles and older (placed by Invisible Network from what the archive says; archives give no ratings)
- Archive
- Library of Congress