Pittsburgh Leader
Front page, 17 October 1909
|
|
| Founder(s) | John W. Pittock |
|---|---|
| Founded | 11 December 1864 (Sunday), 18 October 1870 (daily) |
| Political alignment | Independent |
| Language | English |
| Ceased publication | 14 February 1923 |
| City | Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania |
| Country | United States |
The Pittsburgh Leader was a major newspaper in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, operating from 1864 to 1923.
John W. Pittock, a 21-year-old former newsboy, first published the Leader as a Sunday weekly on 11 December 1864. A daily edition called the Evening Leader appeared on 18 October 1870 under the leadership of Pittock and partners John I. Nevin, Robert P. Nevin, and Edward H. Nevin. The paper took a nonpartisan stance in political matters.
Already in 1873, the Leader was listed in Rowell's American Newspaper Directory as having the largest daily circulation in Pittsburgh. It was also at the time the city's only daily with a Sunday edition, aside from the German-language Volksblatt.
Following Pittock's death in 1881, members of the Nevin family conducted the paper for many years, finally selling it in 1906 to a team led by Alexander Pollock Moore, who became publisher and editor-in-chief. It was often said that ex-political boss William Flinn took part in the purchase and so jeopardized the paper's journalistic independence. Muckraker Will Irwin, writing in Collier's magazine, accused Moore of turning the responsible, civic-minded Leader into a scandalmongering "yellow newspaper."
The Leader and the Pittsburgh Dispatch published their last issues on 14 February 1923, being jointly purchased and absorbed by the other Pittsburgh papers: the Post, Sun, Gazette Times, Chronicle Telegraph, and the Press. At the time, advertisers and publishers had long regarded the Pittsburgh newspaper market as overcrowded. Only four years after the demise of the Leader and Dispatch, mergers further narrowed the field of mainstream Pittsburgh dailies from five to three.
...
Wikipedia