Page:History of Oregon Newspapers.pdf/378

369 journalistic disregard of possible libel suits. The "Oregon style" was their style, decidedly. The Herald of July 29, 1882, thus subtly expressed its opinion of a newly elected legislator of opposite political affiliation:

"If it were not for our newly elected legislator, it would be difficult to find anything to say through a newspaper in this county these dull days. We owe him a debt of gratitude which we fear we never will be able to liquidate. If he should steal a beef this week, he'd swear he didn't next, and that makes trouble, and out of trouble we get many items—and likewise many troubles out of an item sometimes—"getting licked," for example . . . is a bad man, and these bad men are the very life of a wild frontier."

The Examiner also was plain-spoken, though seldom as directly personal as this.

Within a few years (129), probably in 1883, these two frontier papers were merged. James H. Evans, already mentioned as register of the land office, purchased the State Line Herald from C. B. Watson in 1881, but it was run by W. W. Watson and B. P. Watson for a year or so thereafter. Mr. Evans also bought the Examiner and kept its name when the consolidation was effected but adopted Republican politics for the strengthened paper.

Allen & Beach were listed in Ayer's as editors and publishers in the 1885 directory. This regime was followed in 1886 by Beach & Beach (Frank W. and Seneca C.). Seneca Beach was an old Iowa printer who had come to Oregon in 1881 and had helped Joseph A. Bowdoin get out the first issue of the Linkville Star, Klamath's first newspaper, three years later. He became editor and publisher in 1891 and seven years later took in as a partner J. E. McGarry, a former San Francisco reporter, who later became editor. Frank W. Beach later for many years conducted the Pacific Northwest Hotel News at Portland.

The linotype, first one in Lake county, was installed during the ownership of C. O. Metzker. Fred J. Bowman was the next owner. Meanwhile Fred P. Cronemiller, his wife, and three sons, who had started the Evening Herald at Klamath Falls in 1906, purchased the Examiner in 1911. The Cronemiller family retained ownership of the Examiner until October 24, 1935, when C. J. Gillette and Hugh McGilvra of Forest Grove purchased the paper. A son, G. D. Cronemiller, became editor on the death of his father in 1924 and conducted the paper until the sale. C. J. Gillette is (1939) editor and manager.

The biggest story ever run in the Lakeview Examiner was, according to an item in the Roseburg Review, the story of a Silver Lake holocaust in which 40 persons lost their lives. A lamp got on fire in an upstairs hall during Christmas exercises in 1894, and the