March 15 -- A Black Newspaper in Los Angeles
On today’s date in 1933 the Los Angeles Sentinel was founded… This is a black history fact because that makes it the longest-running and most influential black-run newspaper in the Western US that it’s 125,000 readers actually PAY to read.
Started by Col. Leon Washington at a time where black readers would surely NOT find things of interest to them in conventional newspapers. While I am sure that the approach has had to be massaged a bit for new-millennia viability, the same COULD be said for it as it relates to current times as well.
Not that I expect my couple of readers in the LA area to read newspapers. See, I know most (all but one) of them through internets interaction as it were, I am going purely on my source material on this one in the statement that the Sentinel is a “staple for black life in Los Angeles.”
As it were, that is said to be the focus of the paper, so that is the audience catered to.
Yet, I THOUGHT I’d heard nothing of it until I began looking for something to use for today’s post…
Remember that public relations dude that was pushed to quit his position a few years back after he put his foot in his mouth saying that “urban” communities should receive Wal-Mart with open arms since they would effectively put down the mom-and-pops retailers who had been overcharging them for years?
Well that quote was published in the Sentinel before the fire was lit under his ass.
Again, while I have never laid eyes on the newspaper and in all honesty have not picked one up to read the news in years (thanks internets!), it is worth thanking Col. Washington for what he birthed and Danny Bakewell for continuing it to present times.
Started by Col. Leon Washington at a time where black readers would surely NOT find things of interest to them in conventional newspapers. While I am sure that the approach has had to be massaged a bit for new-millennia viability, the same COULD be said for it as it relates to current times as well.
Not that I expect my couple of readers in the LA area to read newspapers. See, I know most (all but one) of them through internets interaction as it were, I am going purely on my source material on this one in the statement that the Sentinel is a “staple for black life in Los Angeles.”
As it were, that is said to be the focus of the paper, so that is the audience catered to.
Yet, I THOUGHT I’d heard nothing of it until I began looking for something to use for today’s post…
Remember that public relations dude that was pushed to quit his position a few years back after he put his foot in his mouth saying that “urban” communities should receive Wal-Mart with open arms since they would effectively put down the mom-and-pops retailers who had been overcharging them for years?
Well that quote was published in the Sentinel before the fire was lit under his ass.
Again, while I have never laid eyes on the newspaper and in all honesty have not picked one up to read the news in years (thanks internets!), it is worth thanking Col. Washington for what he birthed and Danny Bakewell for continuing it to present times.
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