Established as the Bytown Packet in 1845 by William Harris, it was renamed the Citizen in 1851.[6]The newspaper's original motto, which has recently been returned to the editorial page, was Fair Play and Day-Light.[7]
The paper has been through a number of owners. In 1846, Harris sold the paper to John Gordon Bell and Henry J. Friel.[8]Robert Bell bought the paper in 1849, and sold it to I.B. Taylor in 1861.[9]In 1877, Charles Herbert Mackintosh became the principal owner, and he later sold it to Robert and Lewis Shannon.[10]
In 1897, the Citizen became one of several papers owned by the Southam family.[11]
It remained under Southam until the chain was purchased by Conrad Black's Hollinger Inc. in 1996.[7]In 2000, the chain was sold to Canwest Global, which was taken over by Postmedia Network in 2010.[12][13]
The editorial view of the Citizen has varied with its ownership, taking a reform position under Friel,[8] and a conservative position (supporting John A. Macdonald) under Mackintosh.[10]When the Liberals defeated the Tory government in 1896, the owners of the Citizen decided to sell to Southam, rather than face an expected cut in government revenue.[11]In 2002, the Citizen's publisher, Russell Mills, was dismissed following the publication of a story critical of Prime MinisterJean Chrétien and an editorial calling for Chrétien's resignation.[14]
The Citizen published its last Sunday edition on July 15, 2012. This move meant 20 fewer newsroom jobs, and was part of a series of changes made by Postmedia.[15]The Citizen stopped producing a print edition on Mondays as of 17 October 2022, due to the costs of printing and delivery, but it continued to publish a digital Monday edition.[2]
The pre-2014 logo depicted the top of the Peace Tower of Canada's Parliament Buildings in Ottawa. In 2014, the newspaper adopted a new logo showing the paper's name over an outline of the Peace Tower roof on a green background.
Circulation
The Ottawa Citizen's circulation in 2009 was 123,856 copies daily.
Its circulation dropped by 26 percent to 91,796 in 2015.[16]
In Spring 2022, the Ottawa Citizen's unduplicated print and digital average weekday audience was 231,000, and its unduplicated average weekly audience was 490,000.[4]
^"Daily Newspaper Circulation Data". News Media Canada. Retrieved December 16, 2017.
^"Ottawa Citizen's top editor leaves to become CanWest VP". CBC News. November 15, 2007.
^Boswell, Randy (January 23, 2019). "Remembering Peter Calamai: Journalist, Teacher and 'Advocate for Science, Literacy and Journalistic Professionalism' (1943-2019)". Carleton University. Retrieved March 26, 2023.
^"Candidates in Ottawa West-Nepean riding share a fraught political past". The Globe and Mail. May 18, 2014.
^Scanlan, Wayne (June 7, 1996). "There ain't nothing like an old-time sports writer". Ottawa Citizen. Ottawa, Ontario. p. 15.
^"Terry Glavin". Ottawa Citizen.
^Duffy, Andrew (June 30, 2023). "Former Ottawa Citizen columnist one of four Ottawans appointed to the Order of Canada".
^Lederman, Marsha (February 6, 2022). "Former Toronto Star publisher John Honderich, among 'last of the lions' of Canadian journalism, dead at 75". The Globe and Mail.
^Archdeacon, Tom (April 27, 2012). "UD player first 'Mr. Irrelevant' in NFL Draft".
^Chwialkowska, Luiza (May 24, 1998). "Eddie MacCabe: A glimpse it the city's soul". Ottawa Citizen. Ottawa, Ontario. p. 7.
^Brown, Dave (May 23, 1998). "Eddie MacCabe: A local legend lost". Ottawa Citizen. Ottawa, Ontario. p. 27.; Brown, Dave (May 23, 1998). "MacCabe did it well or didn't bother with it at all". Ottawa Citizen. Ottawa, Ontario. p. 28.
^ a b c"Former Citizen editors-in-chief on their proudest moments, greatest disappointments". Ottawa Citizen. November 28, 2020.
^"Jane Taber". Board of Governors, Carleton University.
^Duffy, Andrew (November 25, 2020). "Editors-in-chief: The Citizen newsroom has been led by the formidable and the quirky". Ottawa Citizen.
Sources
Adam, Mohammed. (January 2, 2005). "When we began 1845: For 160 years, the Citizen has been the 'heartbeat of the community". Ottawa Citizen.
Bruce, Charles (1968). News and the Southams. Toronto: Macmillan of Canada. pp. 70–72.
Kesterton, Wilfred H. (1984). A History of Journalism in Canada. Ottawa: Carleton University Press. ISBN 978-0-88629-022-1.
Rutherford, Paul (1982). A Victorian authority: The Daily Press in Late Nineteenth-Century Canada. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-0-8020-5588-0. DDC 71.1. LCC PN4907.
External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Ottawa Citizen.
Official website
Official mobile version Archived October 6, 2018, at the Wayback Machine
Canadian Newspaper Association
The Ottawa Citizen Birth Marriage, Anniversary, Death and Memoriam Notices 1879-1885