New York Daily News
The Daily News is an American newspaper based in Jersey City, New Jersey. It was founded in 1919 by Joseph Medill Patterson in New York City as the Illustrated Daily News. It was the first U.S. daily printed in tabloid format, and reached its peak circulation in 1947, at 2.4 million copies a day. it was the eleventh-highest circulated newspaper in the United States. For much of the 20th century, the paper operated out of the historic art deco Daily News Building with its large globe in the lobby. Today's Daily News is not connected to the earlier New York Daily News, which shut down in 1906.
The Daily News is owned by parent company Daily News Enterprises. This company is owned by Alden Global Capital and was formed when Alden, which also owns news media publisher Digital First Media, purchased then-owner Tribune Publishing in May 2021 and then separated the Daily News from Tribune to form Daily News Enterprises upon the closing of the Tribune acquisition.
History
''Illustrated Daily News''
The Illustrated Daily News was founded by Patterson and his cousin, Robert R. McCormick. The two were co-publishers of the Chicago Tribune and grandsons of Tribune Company founder Joseph Medill, in imitation of the successful British newspaper Daily Mirror. When Patterson and McCormick could not agree on the editorial content of the Chicago paper, the two cousins decided at a meeting in Paris that Patterson would work on launching a Tribune-owned newspaper in New York. On his return, Patterson met with Alfred Harmsworth, Viscount Northcliffe, and the publisher of the Daily Mirror, London's tabloid newspaper. Impressed with the advantages of a tabloid, Patterson launched the Daily News on June 24, 1919, as Illustrated Daily News. The Daily News was owned by the Tribune Company until 1993.''Daily News''
The Daily News was not an immediate success, and by August 1919, the paper's circulation had dropped to 26,625. Still, many of New York's subway commuters found the tabloid format easier to handle, and readership steadily grew. By the time of the paper's first anniversary in June 1920, circulation had climbed over 100,000 and by 1925 over a million. Circulation reached its peak in 1947, at 2.4 million daily and 4.7 million on Sunday.The Daily News carried the slogan "New York's Picture Newspaper" from 1920 to 1991 for its emphasis on photographs. A camera has been part of the newspaper's logo from day one. It became one of the first newspapers in New York City to employ a woman as a staff photographer in 1942 when Evelyn Straus was hired. The paper's later slogan, developed from a 1985 ad campaign, is "New York's Hometown Newspaper", while another was "The Eyes, the Ears, the Honest Voice of New York". The Daily News continues to include large and prominent photographs, for news, entertainment, and sports, as well as intense city news coverage, celebrity gossip, classified ads, comics, a sports section, and an opinion section.
News-gathering operations were, for a time, organized by staff using two-way radios operating on 173.3250 MHz, allowing the assignment desk to communicate with its reporters who used a fleet of "radio cars". Excelling in sports coverage, prominent sports cartoonists have included Bill Gallo, Bruce Stark, and Ed Murawinski. Columnists have included Walter Kaner. Editorial cartoonists have included C. D. Batchelor.
In 1948, the News established WPIX, whose call letters were based on the Newss nickname of "New York's Picture Newspaper"; and later bought what became WPIX-FM, which is now known as WFAN-FM. The television station became a Tribune property outright in 1991, and remains in the former Daily News Building. The radio station was purchased by Emmis Communications, and since 2014 has been owned by CBS Radio as an FM simulcast of its AM namesake.
The paper briefly published a Monday-Friday afternoon counterpart, Daily News Tonight, between August 19, 1980, and August 28, 1981; this competed with the New York Post, which had launched a morning edition to complement its evening newspaper in 1978. Occasional "P.M. Editions" were published as extras in 1991, during the brief tenure of Robert Maxwell as publisher.
From August 10 to November 5, 1978, the multi-union 1978 New York City newspaper strike shut down the three major New York City newspapers. No editions of the News were printed during this time.
In 1982 and again in the early 1990s during a newspaper strike, the Daily News almost went out of business. In the 1982 instance, the parent Tribune Company offered the tabloid up for sale. In 1991, millionaire Robert Maxwell offered financial assistance to the News to help it stay in business. Upon his death later that year, the News seceded from his publishing empire which soon splintered under questions about whether Maxwell had the financial backing to sustain it. Existing management, led by editor James Willse, held the News together in bankruptcy; Willse became interim publisher after buying the paper from the Tribune Company. Mort Zuckerman bought the paper in 1993.
The News at one time maintained local bureaus in the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens. The newspaper still shares offices at City Hall, and within One Police Plaza with other news agencies.
In January 2012, former News of the World and New York Post editor Colin Myler was appointed editor-in-chief of the Daily News. Myler was replaced by his deputy Jim Rich in September 2015.
, it was the ninth-most widely circulated daily newspaper in the United States. In 2019, it was ranked eleventh.
On September 4, 2017, Tronc, the publishing operations of the former Tribune Company, announced that it had acquired the Daily News. Tronc had bought the Daily News for $1, assuming "operational and pension liabilities". By the time of purchase, circulation had dropped to 200,000 on weekdays and 260,000 on Sundays. In July 2018, Tronc fired half of the paper's editorial staff, including the editor-in-chief, Jim Rich. Rich was replaced by Robert York, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Tronc-owned The Morning Call in Allentown, Pennsylvania. The paper's social media staff were included in the cut; images and memes that were later deleted were posted on its Twitter feed.
Tribune Publishing was acquired by Alden Global Capital in May 2021. Upon the close of the deal, the Daily News was transferred to a separate company owned by Alden, Daily News Enterprises. In September 2021, editor Robert York left and was replaced on an interim basis by Andrew Julien, who also serves as the editor and publisher of The Hartford Courant.
The paper was also printed in a Sunday edition called Sunday News.
Editorial stance and style
The New York Times journalist Alan Feuer said the Daily News focuses heavily on "deep sourcing and doorstep reporting", providing city-centered "crime reportage and hard-hitting coverage of public issues rather than portraying New York through the partisan divide between liberals and conservatives". According to Feuer, the paper is known for "speaking to and for the city's working class" and for "its crusades against municipal misconduct".The New York Times has described the Daily Newss editorial stance as "flexibly centrist" with a "high-minded, if populist, legacy". In contrast to its sister publication, the Chicago Tribune, the Daily News was pro-Roosevelt, endorsing him in 1932, 1936, and 1940. It broke from the president, however, in 1941 over foreign policy.
From the 1940s through the 1960s, the Daily News espoused conservative populism. By the mid-1970s however, it began shifting its stance, and during the 1990s, it gained a reputation as a moderately liberal alternative to the conservative Post.
The newspaper endorsed Republican George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election, Democrat Barack Obama in 2008, Republican Mitt Romney in 2012, Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016, and Democrat Joe Biden in 2020.
Headquarters
From its founding, it was based at 25 City Hall Place, just north of City Hall, and close to Park Row, the traditional home of the city's newspaper trade. In 1921, it moved to 23 Park Place, which was in the same neighborhood. The cramped conditions demanded a much larger space for the growing newspaper.From 1929 to 1995, the Daily News was based in 220 East 42nd Street near Second Avenue, an official city and national landmark designed by John Mead Howells and Raymond Hood. The paper moved to 450 West 33rd Street in 1995, but the 42nd Street location is still known as The News Building and still features a giant globe and weather instruments in its lobby. It was the model for the Daily Planet building of the first two Superman films. The former News subsidiary WPIX-TV remains in the building.
The subsequent headquarters of the Daily News at 450 West 33rd Street straddled the railroad tracks going into Pennsylvania Station. The building is now the world headquarters of the Associated Press and is part of Manhattan West.
In June 2011, the paper moved its operations to two floors at 4 New York Plaza in lower Manhattan. Sixteen months later, the structure was severely damaged and rendered uninhabitable by flooding from Hurricane Sandy. In the immediate aftermath, news operations were conducted remotely from several temporary locations, eventually moving to office space at the Jersey City printing plant. In early 2013, operations moved to rented space at 1290 Avenue of the Americas near Rockefeller Center—just four blocks north of its rival New York Post. The staff returned to the permanent 4 New York Plaza location in early November 2013. In August 2020, the Daily News closed its Manhattan headquarters.