The Northwest Enterprise (Seattle, Wash.)
Historic newspapers carry the language, views and graphic reporting of their time, including racist content. They are shown to teen and adult profiles.
1,037 issues from 1931 to 1952, published in Seattle, Washington, digitised for Chronicling America.
The Seattle Enterprise, which would later be called the Enterprise and then finally the Northwest Enterprise, was first published in 1920 by the Seattle Enterprise Publishing Company in Seattle, Washington. Both the paper and publishing company were founded by William Henry Wilson. Born in Connecticut around the year 1876, Wilson published and edited the paper from 1920 to 1935 though it is not clear when he arrived in Seattle. During his time as editor, he became well known as one of the most successful African Americans in Seattle. A leader in the community, Wilson participated in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) as well as the Colored Citizens’ Committee. Over time, he expanded the circulation of the paper to include Montana and Idaho and began to report news from those areas. Wilson largely disappears from the historical record after leaving the Northwest Enterprise.
After 1935, the Northwest Enterprise went through a series of editors in quick succession. Haskell Campbell was the editor for the three months following Wilson’s departure. In November of 1935, Zelmar Lawrence took over and was the editor and publisher until April 1936. George McCoy Francis served as managing editor from June 1936 to April 30, 1937, after which Lawrence returned as editor. Francis had started with the paper as a field representative in Tacoma in 1935 and worked his way up to business manager before becoming managing editor. In January 1938, the editor…
- Genres
- News
- Published in
- Seattle, 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