Chillicothe Constitution-Tribune is a newspaper in Chillicothe, Missouri

Chillicothe, Missouri

Chillicothe is a city in and the county seat of Livingston County, Missouri, United States. The population was 9,515 at the 2010 census. The name "Chillicothe" is Shawnee for "big town", and was named after their Chillicothe, located since 1774 about a mile from the present-day city.Chillicothe is...

. The paper was first published as the Chillicothe Morning Constitution from 1889 until 1930 when it became known as Chillicothe Constitution-Tribune.

History

The newspaper traces its earliest origins to the Chillicothe Constitution which was founded in 1860 as a Democratic leaning newspaper. The Tribune, a Republican leaning newspaper was founded in 1868. In the 1880s the Watkins family became publishers of the Constitution. The two newspapers consolidated March 1, 1928. The Watkins family solid it in April 1972 to Inland Industries, Inc., of Lenexa, Kansas

Lenexa, Kansas

Lenexa is a city in the central part of Johnson County, located in northeast Kansas, in the central United States of America. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 48,190. As a satellite city of Kansas City, Kansas, Lenexa is included in the Kansas City Metropolitan Area...

, and Smith-Walls Newspapers, Incorporated of Fort Payne, Alabama

Fort Payne, Alabama

Fort Payne is a city in DeKalb County, Alabama, United States. At the 2000 census the population was 12,938. The city is the county seat of DeKalb County. It bills itself as the "Official Sock Capital of the World."...

. Clarence Edwin Watkins

Clarence Edwin Watkins

Clarence Edwin Watkins was a long term editor of the Chillicothe Constitution-Tribune.He was born on July 1, 1894 in Chillicothe, Missouri to James Edward Watkins and Martha Pearl Ireland. He died on November 13, 1944 in Chillicothe, Missouri. He was buried on November 15, 1944 in Edgewood...

 served as the publisher till his death in 1944. Rod Dixon is the current publisher and Catherine Stortz Ripley is the current editor. The newspaper is currently owned by GateHouse Media

GateHouse Media

GateHouse Media Inc. is a U.S. newspaper publisher, headquartered in Perinton, New York, that publishes 97 dailies in 20 states and 198 paid weeklies, in addition to free papers, shoppers and specialty and niche publications.- History :Liberty Group Publishing was formed in 1998 when Kenneth L...

.

Jerry Litton

Jerry Litton

Jerry Lon Litton was a Democratic U.S. Representative from Missouri who died with his wife and two children while en route via a small plane to the victory party after winning Missouri's state Democratic primary for U.S. Senate....

visited the newspaper offices about 8:30 p.m. on August 3, 1976 to check election results in which he had won the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate while he was en route to the Chillicothe airport where he was killed about 9 p.m. on takeoff to a victory party in Kansas City.

Fire

On Christmas Day in 1930 a fire broke out in the office of Dr. Oma Dye, located above the newspaper offices. According to the December 26, 1930 edition of the paper two patrons were leaving a nearby theater when they saw smoke coming from the building. As the fire department was arriving on the scene Chillicothe Mayor Harry Pardonner, who was also a fireman, was thrown from the truck as the ladder broke free and swung. According to the paper the Mayor was "badly bruised" and would be confined to bed for several days. The doctor's office was a total loss while the newspaper offices were damaged by water "putting practically all of the machinery in the shop out of commission and spoiling the supply of print paper on hand." The newspaper's publishers assured their readers that every effort had been made to get that day's edition out via the old method of "setting the type by hand."