As Watonga begins its 130th year, so does the Watonga Republican.
Contrary to popular belief, it wasn’t the first newspaper, though. That was the Watonga Rustler, begun by Charles Burrell. The Republican was first printed Oct. 12, 1892. Because of leap years, the anniversary by editions is Oct. 3.
It must have been incredibly difficult in those early days to get a newspaper out. There was no rural mail delivery, so the local paper was the source for news. Residents took the paper and if necessary, paid the publisher in wood, potatoes, corn and the like.
Those were the days of moveable type. That was metal letters, placed in wooden trays, spelling each word backward so that when it was rolled with ink – also by hand – it printed right side up on paper. Every letter, every word, every story, typeset by hand.
It is from this that we get the terms ‘upper case’ and “lower case’ because capital letters were kept in racks in the top trays and small letters in trays on the bottom.
The local news was printed on blank pages included with a bundle of ready-printed pages from the Western Newspaper Union, akin to today’s Associated Press. Today a paper chooses what AP stories to include, whereas then they ran what they were provided.
The editor, TB Ferguson in this case, did the jobs of writer, business manager, bookkeeper, proofreader and often ran the press as well. Elva, or Mrs. TB as she was best known, was at his side as much as running a household with small children would allow. She worked in the paper for 37 years, nine of them alone after TB passed away.
The papers were almost always of one political bent or another, which is why there remain so many with the name Republican or Democrat. When there were two papers in a town where there was barely enough ad revenue for one paper, they often went head-to-head, running scathing editorials that pointed out the fallacies and failings of the other party and paper and getting as good as they gave.
Yet the story is told that in one such rivalry, an editor had just put his own paper to print when he learned that the man he had lambasted in print had sickness and death in his family. However, if the opposing paper did not print, it would lose its legal status and that editor lose his paper and his livelihood. So the first editor worked through the night and put out not only his own paper, with his views and news, but that of his rival as well.
This is the story of early newspaper in Oklahoma, in Watonga. There have been other industries that have become the subject of feature films, but none as early as the Republican, which provided the background for the book and movie Cimmaron.
Those who came before us fought the good fight, took their licks and got up to do it all over again, despite the difficulty or consequences.
So, it is with pride and humility the Republican accepts the laurels and challenges, stepping brightly into its 130th year.