Historical records matching Alexander McMinn
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About Alexander McMinn
OLD MANAWATU, OR THE WILD DAYS OF THE WEST. BY T. LINDSAY BUICK, J.P., PALMERSTON NORTH : BUICK & YOUNG, PRINTERS, CUBA STREET. 1903.
On the 20th of November, 1880, Mr. Alexander McMinn published the first issue of " The Manawatu Daily Standard. 1 ' The paper was printed on the hand-press which printed the first number of the " Wanganui Herald," and afterwards the first number of " The Examiner," at Woodville, and the first copy " pulled" was presented to Mr. Sylvester Coleman, a well-known pioneer and former Borough Councillor. The introductory "leader" was contributed by the late Hon. John Ballance, with whom Mr. McMinn had been associated on the " Herald " away back in the " sixties." The " Standard " was the first daily paper published between Wellington and Whanganui. The "Times" following suit two years afterwards, then the "Rangitikei Advocate", and the "Feilding Star" at a much later date. Considering the size and state of the town, the establishment of a daily paper was a venturesome plunge, and the years of struggle and anxiety which it involved might have killed a dozen less sanguine men than Mr. McMinn, but there were soon troubles to engage the attention of the local newspaper proprietors other than financial worries, for with the advent of a " reptile contemporary " it was not long before there were razors flying through the journalistic air. In their references to each other the papers became anything but too polite, and on looking over old files we see such striking titles to the leading articles as " A Registered Slanderer," " The Trail of the Viper," " Disreputable Journalism," and in one wild effusion we find the following crushing denunciation of a brother journalist which is typical of the period: " There are spots to be found on the sun, there are scabby sheep in all flocks, and we regret to say that the ranks of colonial journalism has at least one representative who is a disgrace to the order, and a worthy follower of his prototype, Ananias." This pace was, of course, too severe to last, and it led to the natural but rather serious result of one of the editors standing his trial for criminal libel at the sittings of the Supreme Court. After that, wiser counsels prevailed, and a holy calm pervaded the journalistic mind. What outbursts of editorial anger there have been since then are too recent to be revived here, but it is gratifying to know that the journals of the town are now conducted with a much greater regard for the legitimate functions of a newspaper, and the occasions upon which an editor rises in his wrath to smite his contemporary are rare in occurrence, and his chastisements comparatively mild in their severity.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/219093835/alexander-mcminn
Rival John Boulger Dungan was editor and proprietor of the Manawatu Times in 1878 and accused McMinn of pirating his news telegrams and regularly wrote in highly derogatory terms of his competitor in Palmerston North.
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Alexander McMinn's Timeline
| 1842 |
August 28, 1842
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Dundonald, Castlereagh, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom
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1842
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Dundonald, Castlereagh, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom
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| 1867 |
April 22, 1867
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New Zealand
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| 1872 |
September 15, 1872
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Wellington, New Zealand
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| 1874 |
November 10, 1874
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Turakina, Manawatu-Wanganui, New Zealand
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| 1876 |
October 26, 1876
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Whanganui, Manawatu-Wanganui, New Zealand
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| 1879 |
1879
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| 1880 |
August 14, 1880
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Marton, Manawatu-Wanganui, New Zealand
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