Newspaper has colorful history

SCOTT WYLAND, THE OLYMPIAN

Originally published Saturday, January 12, 2002

The Olympian is a descendant of a daily newspaper that was founded in 1890 to give people news they could read over a morning cup of coffee.

Known as the Morning Olympian, it competed against the fledgling Olympia Tribune, which rolled off the presses in the afternoon.

Type was set by hand, and the newspaper's 400 subscribers paid $10 yearly.

In 1891, Thomas Henderson Boyd bought the Morning Olympian. Boyd had a reputation as a savvy businessman and brilliant writer, but he soon would become fodder for his own newspaper: He died at the hands of his mistress in December 1892.

On March 7, 1893, three months after Boyd's death, the Morning Olympian was sold to a trio of buyers who combined the paper with the Tribune.

The hybrid was renamed the Morning Olympian-Tribune.

On New Year's Eve 1894, some printers literally sawed off "Tribune" from the wooden template, shortening the name to the original Morning Olympian.

The next year, the owners decided to change the Olympian to an evening paper.

Then in 1901, another rival newspaper emerged: The Olympia Daily Recorder.

B.A. Perkins bought the Daily Recorder in 1902, and helped the paper gain a foothold within the city.

In 1906, the Morning Olympian was sold to a retired minister, who set up shop in the Reed Building on Legion Way. The newspaper changed owners a couple more times, and eventually wound up in Perkins' hands.

Perkins ran the Morning Olympian and the Recorder in separate buildings for a few months before putting the rivals under the same roof, and on the same floor, at Capitol Way and Third Avenue.

For more than 20 years, the two continued to compete, even though their respective newsrooms abutted within the same building. In 1927, the newspapers merged into The Daily Olympian.

On July 1, 1971, Gannett Co. bought The Daily Olympian.

"Daily" was dropped from the newspaper's name in 1982. That same year, USA Today began printing on The Olympian's presses.

Seven years later, The Olympian became a morning paper for the first time in 95 years. In that sense, it has come full circle.

The Olympian Copyright 2002

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