Page:History of Oregon Newspapers.pdf/281

272 four-page paper, 21×28, and the subscription price was $2.50. The next year the publishers were Porter & Parker.

The next paper, following several years after the demise of the Republican, was the Junction City Pilot, established in 1888 as a Democratic weekly, issued on Fridays, by J. M. McCollum. In 1890 the paper was conducted by J. B. Morin and Ira Phelps. The next year the paper was suspended when Morin went to Harrisburg and started the Courier.

This left the promising field open, and it was soon occupied by the Times, founded by S. L. Moorhead. Morin paid the following tribute to Junction in announcing, through the Harrisburg Courier, the approaching advent of the Times: "The Junction City Times will appear next week. The field in which the Times will work is a good one, and though we abandoned it only a few weeks ago, the reason is not that we loved Junction less, but because we love our present location more."

But—Mr. Morin and his Courier were gone from Harrisburg in three years, while Mr. Moorhead carried on the Times for about 23 years.

Mr. Moorhead's salutatory on going to Junction from Eugene and bringing out the first issue October 10, 1891, was, in a modest way, rather a model for that type of article. It read:

"The Times greets you brightly and cheerily, and we trust it will as responsive a throb from the hearts of the people with whom we are associated. Its mission will be to assist every enterprise that will tend to the upbuilding of city and community, and while we can do but little ourself, we will be found in the procession of progress battling for the interests of all.

The Times will eschew politics and pursue an independent course. We may have occasion to make mention of certain nominees when the time arrives, but each deviation will be in the interest of this part of the county. ..

We want the assistance and hearty cooperation of every citizen, irrespective of party affiliation. . . . We have an abiding faith in this little city, and we are here to stay. While we cannot please all, we will aim to do what is just and right between man and man."

A prospectus carried in another column declared the paper to be "fearless, free, and independent," resembling Bob Johnson's "independent, fearless, and free" on the Corvallis Times two years before.

Moorhead gave the people a good home-town weekly, and appreciation was expressed by a steady increase in advertising. He was mayor of the town in 1895. During the early years of the paper's