New Orleans Times-Picayune
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The Times-Picayune is the major daily U.S. newspaper serving New Orleans, Louisiana.
The newspaper began publishing in 1837 as the Picayune, named after the Spanish coin equivalent to 6¼¢ (1/16 dollar)—which was the price of the paper. It became The Times-Picayune after merging with its rival paper in 1914. S.I. Newhouse bought the Times-Picayune and the other remaining New Orleans daily, the States-Item, in 1962, and merged the papers in 1980. The merged paper was called The Times Picayune The States Item from 1980 to 1986. Specific community editions of the newspaper are also circulated and retain the Picayune name (e.g., Gretna Picayune for nearby Gretna). The paper is owned by Advance Publications, owned by the Newhouse family.
Through the years writers like William Faulkner and O. Henry have worked for the paper. It was awarded two Pulitzer Prizes in 1997, and in 2006 won two more Pulitzer Prizes for its coverage of Hurricane Katrina.
The paper's editorial stance is moderate to conservative, depending on the subject. It generally endorses Republicans in state and federal elections.[[Citing sources citation needed]] It endorsed George W. Bush for president in 2000, but endorsed no presidential candidate in 2004. In gubernatorial contests it endorsed Mike Foster and later Bobby Jindal . In the mayoral race of 2006, the Times-Picayune endorsed right-leaning Democrat Ron Forman in the primary election and Lt. Governor Mitch Landrieu in the runoff.
Hurricane Katrina
As Hurricane Katrina hit, the newspaper's staff of 140 first tried to ride the storm out in the center of the building housing the newspaper, sleeping in sleeping bags and on air mattresses. After deciding to evacuate, they set up operations in classrooms in Baton Rouge, on the Louisiana State University campus.The August 30, August 31, and September 1, 2005 editions were not printed, but were available online, as was the paper's breaking news weblog. A weblog entry for August 30 written by Bruce Nolan gave the paper's first summary of the disaster:
- "Hurricane Katrina struck metropolitan New Orleans on Monday with a staggering blow, far surpassing Hurricane Betsy, the landmark disaster of an earlier generation. The storm flooded huge swaths of the city, as well as Slidell on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain, in a process that appeared to be spreading even as night fell."
The paper published a strongly-worded open letter to President George W. Bush in its September 4 edition, criticizing him for the federal government's response to Hurricane Katrina and calling for the firing of FEMA chief Michael D. Brown.
In a January 14, 2006 address to the American Bar Association's Communications Lawyers Forum, Times-Picayune editor Jim Amoss commented on perhaps the greatest challenge that the staff faced then, and continued to face as the future of New Orleans is contemplated:
- "For us, Katrina is and will be a defining moment of our lives, a story we'll be telling till the day we die. Being a part of the plot is both riveting and deeply unsettling. We don't yet know the end of this story ... It's the story of our lives, and we must both live and chronicle it."
References
External links
- [Official website], including the paper's [breaking news weblog]
- [The Times-Picayune's history of the Times-Picayune]
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