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 The October 17, 2018, front page ofThe Republican | |
| Type | Daily newspaper |
|---|---|
| Format | Broadsheet |
| Owner | Advance Publications |
| Founder | Samuel Bowles II |
| Publisher | George Arwady |
| Editor | Larry Parnass |
| Founded | September 8, 1824 (201 years ago) (1824-09-08) |
| Language | English |
| Headquarters | 1860 Main St, Springfield, MA 01103 |
| City | Springfield, Massachusetts |
| Country | United States |
| Circulation | 8,593 (as of September 24, 2025)1 |
| ISSN | 1941-529X (print) 2641-2829 (web) |
| OCLC number | 52000893 |
| Website | masslive |
The Republican is a newspaper based inSpringfield, Massachusetts, covering news in theGreater Springfield area, as well as national news and pieces fromBoston,Worcester and northern Connecticut. It is owned byNewhouse Newspapers, a division ofAdvance Publications. Throughout much of the 19th century, the paper was the largest circulating daily inNew England and the most widely-read across the U.S., and played a key role in theUnited States Republican Party's founding.Abraham Lincoln was an avid reader. The newspaper became the first American periodical to publish a poem authored by anAfrican American writer.
By 2025,The Republican's daily circulation had plummeted to 8,593, according to an audit published in the newspaper on September 24, 2025.[1][2] Content fromThe Republican is published online toMassLive, a separate Advance Publications company.MassLive had a record six million unique monthly visitors in June 2019.[3]
Established by Samuel Bowles II in 1824[4] as a ruralweekly, the newspaper was converted into a daily in 1844. From the beginning, it focused on local news. As rapidly as possible, its news-gathering operation was extended until, and within a few years its columns contained items from every town and hamlet along the Connecticut Valley, as well as from Springfield. It achieved national renown in the 19th century under the tenure ofSamuel Bowles III, a legacy that was passed to his son, Samuel Bowles IV, and grandson, Sherman Bowles.
In 1854, the newspaper reportedly became the first to publish the oldest known work of literature by anAfrican American.[7] A 16-year-old namedLucy Terry (1733–1821) witnessed two White families attacked by Native Americans in 1746. The fight took place inDeerfield, Mass. Known as “Bars Fight,” her poem was told orally until it was published, thirty-three years after her death, first in the Springfield Daily Republican, on November 20, 1854. The poem appeared inJosiah Gilbert Holland'sHistory of Western Massachusetts the following year.[8][9][10]
In 1855, Bowles III called for the founding of a new party that would abolish slavery. He suggested the name "Republican". Once abolitionists founded a party by this name,The Republican became one of its most unrelenting supporters.
Bowles III believed that the newspaper should be a power in the moral, religious and literary, as well as the political life of the community, and he tried to make his paper fulfill those functions. With the aid ofJ. G. Holland and others who joined the staff the paper attained excellent literary quality and a high moral tone. Its opinions soon reached allNew England, and after the formation of the Republican Party, they extended far beyond the limits of any section.
During the controversies affectingslavery and resulting in theAmerican Civil War, Bowles supported, in general, theWhig andRepublican parties, but in the period ofReconstruction under PresidentUlysses S. Grant, his paper represented anti-administration orLiberal Republican opinions, while in the disputedelection of 1876 it favored the claims ofSamuel J. Tilden, and subsequently became independent in politics.[11] Its editorial board endorsed the Democratic candidate for president in every modern election, except the 2008 election, in which the newspaper, under publisher Larry McDermott, endorsed RepublicanJohn McCain in his failed White House bid. The newspaper subsequently endorsed PresidentBarack Obama in his 2012 reelection campaign.
During Bowles' lifetime, and subsequently, theRepublican office was a sort of school for young journalists, especially in the matter of pungency and conciseness of style, one of his maxims being: "put it all in the first paragraph".[11]
In 1849, Bowles hiredJosiah Gilbert Holland, a poet who had studied medicine and taught school in theAmerican South. Soon, the assistant editor purchased an interest in the newspaper and wrote spiritual and advice columns.
Under the leadership of editor Bowles and assistant editor Holland, theRepublican became the most widely-read and respected small town daily in America.
Bowles was an acquaintance ofEmily Dickinson, and he published a handful of the very few poems that she printed in her lifetime, including "A narrow fellow in the grass" and "Safe in their alabaster chambers".
Bowles was succeeded as publisher and editor-in-chief of theRepublican by his son Samuel Bowles (b. 1851).[11]
Charles Dow, founder ofDow Jones andThe Wall Street Journal, started his career as a business reporter for theSpringfield Daily Republican as an apprentice to the newspaper's owner Samuel Bowles III.[12]
The Republican launched the careers of several prominent journalists and novelists.I. E. "Sy" Sanborn, longtime Chicago sportswriter and one of the original organizers of theBaseball Writers' Association of America in 1908, began his career atThe Republican. Radio's "poet laureate"Norman Corwin was a reporter forThe Republican in the 1930s.[13] NovelistTom Wolfe was a reporter forThe Springfield Union in the late 1950s.[14]
The title "Ms." was first suggested by an anonymous 1901 letter toThe Republican. The letter read, in part, "To call a maiden Mrs. is only a shade worse than to insult a matron with the inferior title Miss. Yet it is not always easy to know the facts... The abbreviation 'Ms.' is simple, it is easy to write, and the person concerned can translate it properly according to the circumstances."[15]
In 1915,Samuel Bowles, who had been dead for nearly four decades, was compared toWilliam Rockhill Nelson, publisher ofThe Kansas City Star, who died that year. "Of course,The Star was William R. Nelson even more thanThe Springfield Republican wasSamuel Bowles," wrote theChicago Post in a tribute.[16]
During the 1920s, Sherman Bowles, son of Samuel Bowles IV, constructed a modern printing plant at 32 Cypress Street in Springfield and launched the hostile takeover of three competitors. His newspaper monopoly controlled a combined circulation of 280,000. He died on March 3, 1952, of a heart attack at the age of 61.[17]
In 1960, Advance Publications, owned by the Newhouse family, purchased a 40 percent stock interest in the Republican Company, Inc., holder ofThe SpringfieId Union,The Springfield Sunday Republican andThe Springfield Daily News. The Newark, New Jersey–based company had an agreement with the Bowles heirs to purchase their 45 percent stock holdings in the Springfield companies on Sept. 1, 1967. The purchase was opposed by the editors of the newspapers and a prolonged legal battle ensued.[18] An organization called the Springfield Newspapers became the local division of the Newhouse family empire with David Starr, a vice president for Advance, serving as publisher.[19]
TheSpringfield Daily News and theMorning Union merged operations in the 1970s, operating as separate papers, even endorsing different candidates for the same offices. The circulation for theMorning Union was reported at 128,041 on October 8, 1972.[20] TheSpringfield Daily News circulation stood at 92,342 on September 30, 1972.[21] Eventually the two newspapers were combined intoThe Union-News (a morning paper) in 1988, withThe Sunday Republican published on Sundays.
Larry McDermott served as publisher for a decade beginning in 1999 and the newspaper reverted to its historical, pre-Union-News name ofThe Republican around 2003. At the start of McDermott's tenure, circulation for theUnion-News was 90,555.[22] By September 2005, it had slipped by less than 5 percent to 86,359.[23] With McDermott's retirement in December 2009, George Arwady became publisher ofThe Republican. He was previously publisher ofThe Newark Star-Ledger, where he had threatened to shutter that newspaper amid financial crises.[24][25]
In 2019, the New England Newspaper Association awardedThe Republican its Newspaper of the Year as a daily, and among Sunday newspapers, for its investigative reporting on the Springfield Police Department controversies earlier that year.[26]
Longtime editor and Yankee Quill winner Wayne E. Phaneuf retired in 2020 and was succeeded by Cynthia G. Simison and later Larry Parnass.[27][28]
As with many daily newspapers,The Republican has seen its advertising base erode and circulation shrink in recent years.[when?] Its reported daily circulation was down to 8,593 in September 2025, a tenth of where it stood one quarter of a century earlier. The newspaper marked its 200th anniversary on September 8, 2024.[29]
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Bowles, Samuel".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 4 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 344.{{cite web}}:|last= has generic name (help){{cite web}}:|last= has generic name (help)Cambridge History of English and American Literature (1921) in the public domain.
