The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has long been serving as the only major daily newspaper in the whole Atlanta area, including its suburbs. It is commonly known as AJC, and is currently owned by the Cox Enterprise. On its most basic, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution is the final synthesis of the merger between the Atlanta Journal and the Atlanta Constitution. The staff of these two papers was combined in 1982, and all separate delivery of the morning Constitution and the afternoon Journal ended in 2001.
Following to the staff consolidation in 1982, the afternoon Atlanta Journal had maintained a center-right editorial page, while the editorials and op-eds in the morning Atlanta Constitution was reliable liberal. It is further interesting to know that when the editions of both papers were finally combined in 2001, the editorial page staffs also merged. With the merger of these two powerful papers, it’s no wonder that the editorials and op-eds have attempted to strike a more balanced tone. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, since 2003, has also published Access Atlanta, which is a free tabloid-sized entertainment paper.
The Morning Atlanta Constitution
Now part of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Atlanta Constitution was actually first published on June 16, 1868 and by 1871, it had killed off the only Atlanta paper to survive during the American Civil War – the Daily Intelligencer. Captain Evan Howell who was a former Intelligencer city editor purchased a controlling interest on the paper in 1876 and he became its editor-in-chief. Also, that same year, Joel Chandler Harris started writing the paper and soon invented the character of Uncle Remus, a black storyteller. It was only during the 1880s when this part of today’s Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s editor, Henry W. Grady started to become the spokesman for the New South, promoting industrial development in the South.
The Atlanta Constitution, as part of today’s Atlanta Journal-Constitution, saw its first victory when it won a Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing in 1959 for Ralph McGill’s editorial. It also won the same prize in 1967 for Eugene Patterson’s editorials. In 1960, Jack Nelson won the Pulitzer Prize for local reporting, exposing abuses at Milledgeville State Hospital for the mentally ill. And, in 1988, the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning was given to the Constitution’s Doug Marlette and Mike Luckovich in 1995.
The Afternoon Atlanta Journal
The year 1883 saw the birth of Atlanta Journal, the other important part of today’s Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Its founder was E.F. Hoge who sold the paper to Atlanta lawyer Hoke Smith in 1887. In 1922, the Journal established Atlanta’s first radio station, the WSB. Both the newspaper and radio station were sold in 1939 to James Middleton Cox, founder of what would become Cox Enterprise.
The Merger
Prior to the birth of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Cox Enterprise first bought the Constitution in June 1950, bringing both newspapers under one ownership and combining sales and administrative offices. However, separate newsrooms were kept until 1982, though both the newspapers were published. The afternoon Journal led the morning Constitution until the 1970s when the afternoon papers started to fall out of favor with subscribers. It was only in November 2001 when the two newspapers, which were once fierce competitors, merged to produce one daily morning paper – the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
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