Cowles Company
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| Private | |
| Industry | Publishing, Manufacturing, Media, Real estate |
| Founded | c. 1894 |
| Founder | William H. Cowles |
| Headquarters | Spokane, Washington, US |
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Area served
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Spokane, Washington, Spokane Valley, Washington, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, Inland Empire |
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Key people
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Elizabeth A. Cowles (chair) W. Stacey Cowles (publisher) |
| Website | cowlescompany |
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Footnotes / references Real Cities, McClatchy Interactive |
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The Cowles Company is a diversified media company in Spokane, Washington in the US. The company owns and operates the newspaper The Spokesman-Review in Spokane, founded in 1894. The company operates Inland Empire Paper Company, television stations, and interests in real estate, insurance, marketing and financial services.
William Stacey Cowles, the publisher of The Spokesman-Review, is the great-grandson of the company's founder, William H. Cowles, and the fourth generation of the Cowles family to run the paper. His sister, Elizabeth A. Cowles, is chairwoman of the parent company. Rob Curley is the editor.
William H. Cowles came to Spokane at age 24 to be the business manager of the Spokesman, which was founded less than two years before, and excelled at local news coverage. He had experience as a police reporter for the Chicago Tribune and was the son of the Tribune's treasurer, Alfred Cowles, Sr. He soon bought the Spokesman from his partners. In 1893, he bought a rival paper, the Review, and merged the two papers into The Spokesman-Review. He acquired the Chronicle in 1897. According to Time in 1952, he was a "determined man" who had an artificial leg yet walked two miles to the office each day.
Cowles set the Chronicle on a course to be independent, and The Spokesman-Review to support Republican Party causes. Time magazine related the paper's success gaining lowered rates for freight carried to the Northwest United States and an improved park system and that helped the region. Increasing its reputation for comprehensive local news and by opposing "gambling, liquor and prostitution," The Spokesman-Review gained popularity. The paper's opposition to building the Grand Coulee Dam was not quite so universally applauded and when it opposed the New Deal and the Fair Deal, it so disturbed President of the United States Harry Truman that he declared the Spokesman-Review to be one of the "two worst" newspapers in the United States. The Scripps League's Press closed in 1939, making Cowles the only newspaper publisher in Spokane. Cowles created four weeklies, the Idaho Farmer, Washington Farmer, Oregon Farmer and Utah Farmer. Cowles died in 1946. When William H. Cowles, Jr. succeeded his father as publisher, James Bracken received much more news and editorial control as managing editor.
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Wikipedia