The Times and Democrat is a daily
newspaperA newspaper is a publication containing news, information, and advertising. General-interest newspapers often feature articles on political events, crime, business, art/entertainment, society and sports. Most traditional papers also feature an editorial page containing columns that express the...
in
Orangeburg, South CarolinaOrangeburg, also known as "The Garden City," is the principal city and county seat of Orangeburg County, South Carolina, United States. The city population was 12,765 at the 2000 census , within a Greater Orangeburg population of approximately 45,000...
. The Times and Democrat is owned by
Lee EnterprisesLee Enterprises is a publicly traded American media company. It publishes 56 daily newspapers in 23 states, and more than 300 weekly, classified, and specialty publications. Lee Enterprises was founded in 1890 by A.W...
, a company based in
Davenport, IowaDavenport is a city located along the Mississippi River in Scott County, Iowa, United States. Davenport is the county seat of and largest city in Scott County. As of the 2000 census, the city had a population of 98,359 and is Iowa's third-largest city. Davenport is one of the Quad Cities, along...
. It has a daily circulation of 17,040, and a Sunday circulation of 16,876.
The Times and Democrat traces its history to the October 1881 merger of
The Orangeburg Democrat and
The Orangeburg Times. It also has ties to four other newspapers born in the aftermath of the
American Civil WarThe American Civil War , also known as the War Between the States and several other names, was a civil war in the United States of America. Eleven Southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America...
:
The Southron,
The Tax-Payer,
The Edisto Clarion and
The Orangeburg News and Times.
The Times and Democrat is a daily
newspaperA newspaper is a publication containing news, information, and advertising. General-interest newspapers often feature articles on political events, crime, business, art/entertainment, society and sports. Most traditional papers also feature an editorial page containing columns that express the...
in
Orangeburg, South CarolinaOrangeburg, also known as "The Garden City," is the principal city and county seat of Orangeburg County, South Carolina, United States. The city population was 12,765 at the 2000 census , within a Greater Orangeburg population of approximately 45,000...
. The Times and Democrat is owned by
Lee EnterprisesLee Enterprises is a publicly traded American media company. It publishes 56 daily newspapers in 23 states, and more than 300 weekly, classified, and specialty publications. Lee Enterprises was founded in 1890 by A.W...
, a company based in
Davenport, IowaDavenport is a city located along the Mississippi River in Scott County, Iowa, United States. Davenport is the county seat of and largest city in Scott County. As of the 2000 census, the city had a population of 98,359 and is Iowa's third-largest city. Davenport is one of the Quad Cities, along...
. It has a daily circulation of 17,040, and a Sunday circulation of 16,876.
History and origins
The Times and Democrat traces its history to the October 1881 merger of
The Orangeburg Democrat and
The Orangeburg Times. It also has ties to four other newspapers born in the aftermath of the
American Civil WarThe American Civil War , also known as the War Between the States and several other names, was a civil war in the United States of America. Eleven Southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America...
:
The Southron,
The Tax-Payer,
The Edisto Clarion and
The Orangeburg News and Times. Like most newspapers of the South during Reconstruction, the Orangeburg publications were embroiled in political doctrines. The
Orangeburg News, for instance, was organized as a newspaper of the
DemocratsThe Democratic Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. It is the oldest political party in continuous operation in the United States and it is one of the oldest parties in the world. In the U.S...
but later made the bold move of becoming a newspaper of the
RepublicansThe Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the Grand Old Party or the GOP, despite being the younger of the two major parties. In the U.S...
.
Into this milieu came James L. Sims. The Charleston, SC native learned the printing trade at
The Charleston Courier and subsequently purchased an interest in
The Spartanburg Herald. When his wife died, Sims sold his interest and moved to Orangeburg. In 1878 he purchased
The Edisto Clarion, successor to
The Tax-Payer, and changed its name again, to
The Orangeburg Democrat. Sims'
editorEditing is the process of selecting and preparing language, images, sound, video, or film through processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications in various media...
at the Democrat was Stiles R. Mellichamp, who after a short period left to start his own newspaper,
The Orangeburg Times. In 1881 Sims and Mellichamp came together again to merge their newspapers into
The Times and Democrat.
A close Orangeburg newspaper colleague of Sims in those early days was Hugo S. Sheridan. Some years later, Sims married Sheridan's daughter. From this marriage came four sons, three of whom were involved in the paper. James Izlar Sims, the oldest, dropped out of school at age 14 to work at
The Times and Democrat.
The news content was a little different back then. One of the biggest events of the year was the ginning of the first bale of
cottonCotton is a soft, staple fiber that grows in a form known as a boll around the seeds of the cotton plant, a shrub native to tropical and subtropical regions around the world, including the Americas, India and Africa. The fiber most often is spun into yarn or thread and used to make a soft,...
. Automobiles running into mules and cows usually got big play. Sports received little attention. Typesetting was done by hand, one letter at a time, until 1906, when
The Times and Democrat purchased a new Ottmar Mergenthaler
Linotype machineThe Linotype machine is a "line casting" machine used in printing. The machine revolutionized printing and especially newspaper publishing, making it possible for a relatively small number of operators to set type for many pages on a daily basis.The Linotype machine operator enters text on a ...
at a cost of $3,600. J. Izlar Sims, then 16 years old, was sent to
New YorkNew York is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States and is the nation's third most populous. The state is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
to learn how to operate the new machine that was destined to revolutionize the newspaper industry. Five years later, at the age of 21, he succeeded his father as publisher. J. Izlar Sims also founded a radio station and brought the first talking picture (movie theater) to Orangeburg, in the late 1920s. He was a volunteer firefighter and often drove the city's first fire truck. He died in 1957.
J.L. Sims' twin boys, Hugo and Henry Sims, shared the editorship of the newspaper until Henry was elected to the South Carolina State Senate in the 1930s and later became president of Winthrop College. Hugo Sims continued as editor until his death in 1951.
The youngest son, Gelzer Sims, graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy and achieved the rank of admiral during World War II.
Mellichamp and Sheridan became full-time educators. Today Orangeburg elementary schools bear each of their names.
A weekly publication since its founding,
The Times and Democrat began publishing twice a week in 1908, three times a week in 1909 and five times a week in September 1919. It returned to tri-weekly publication in May 1921 but later resumed daily publication. A Monday edition was added in the 1940s and the Sunday edition in 1953.
J.L. Sims succeeded his father as publisher in 1943. In 1951 Hugo Sims Sr. died and his son, Edward, succeeded him as editor. In the 1960s, Hugo Sims' other two sons, Hugo Jr. and Henry, served as co-editors. After J.L. Sims died in 1962 at age 47, surviving family members named Dean Livingston, 29, as publisher, a position he held until his
retirementRetirement is the point where a person stops employment completely . A person may also semi-retire by reducing work hours...
in 1999.
A century ago,
The Times and Democrat was the first newspaper in town to buy a cylinder press. In 1965
The Times and Democrat became South Carolina's first daily newspaper to convert to
offset printingOffset printing is a commonly used printing technique where the inked image is transferred from a plate to a rubber blanket, then to the printing surface...
. In 1989
The Times and Democrat became
South CarolinaSouth Carolina is a U.S. state that borders Georgia to the south and North Carolina to the north. Originally part of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was one of the 13 colonies that declared independence from the British Crown during the American Revolution. The colony was...
's first daily newspaper to design its pages entirely with computers.
The Times and Democrat has continued to publish daily despite hurricanes, snowstorms and a 1972 fire that destroyed
The Times and Democrat's entire physical plant. Within five days of that fire, new typesetting machines and other production equipment were flown in. Within 10 days, a new
pressA printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a medium , thereby transferring an image. The mechanical systems involved were first assembled in Germany by the goldsmith Johannes Gutenberg around 1440, based on existing screw-presses used to press...
had arrived, and within 30 days, the pressroom building had been rebuilt around it.
Howard PublicationsHoward Publications was a family-owned company of 16 newspapers. The company was acquired by Lee Enterprises on February 12, 2002 for $694 million...
acquired total ownership of
The Times and Democrat in 1981.
Lee EnterprisesLee Enterprises is a publicly traded American media company. It publishes 56 daily newspapers in 23 states, and more than 300 weekly, classified, and specialty publications. Lee Enterprises was founded in 1890 by A.W...
acquired Howard Publications and subsequently
The Times and Democrat in 2002.
Cathy Hughes became
The Times and Democrat's fifth publisher in 1999. The current editor is Lee Harter.
Like many of today's newspapers,
The Times and Democrat now publishes a website to complement its print edition.
Further reading
T&D Staff Report.
The T&D is Born. Orangeburg, SC:
The Times and Democrat. October 3, 2004.
External links