Page:History of Oregon Newspapers.pdf/351

342 of the publisher, says, "about 1875.") The paper, then published by E. S. McComas and his partner-printer, Jasper Stevens, was a seven-column folio, issued each Saturday and printed on a Washington hand-press. The original subscription price was $4 a year. The paper, Democratic in politics, was edited, successively, by E. S. McComas, his brother W. H. McComas, F. M. Ish, Ed. E. Gates, John E. Jeffrey, J. B. Fithian, L. B. Rinehart, J. O. Kuhn and George H. Owen, partners, until its suspension in 1886. The plant was moved to La Grande by Owen & Kuhn that year and used to start the Journal, a Democratic paper.

A high point in the history of this paper was its publication of the first daily edition in Union county. Beginning Monday, September 3, 1883, L. J. Davis and J. E. Jeffreys published the Daily Sentinel, a four-column folio, in the Sentinel office at Union. The daily, which appears to have been a separate venture from the weekly, ran for six consecutive issues, then suspended.

Another achievement was the publication of an Indian war extra June 20, 1877, while the paper was still a weekly. The editor was E. S. McComas, elsewhere mentioned (108) in connection with his interview with Chief Joseph. The extra, apparently printed on a job no press, was really more of a special edition, since it contained other material and was not made-over from a previous regular issue. The text, with its hortatory editorial head and its skeletonized construction, follows:

Union, June 20, 10 o'clock A. M. Latest reports by courier from Walla Walla to Mr. Veasey in Wallowa, inform the settlers that a large band of Indians are heading in the direction of the Wallowa Valley.

Captain Perry and many soldiers under his command, surrounded in a canyon on Slate Creek.

Captain Perry killed.

Lieutenant Boomis wounded.

Many soldiers killed and the remainder fighting desperately against heavy odds.