Newspaper has long history here
This Pea Ridge newspaper observed its 55th birthday Friday, Jan. 1.
Its birth and early years were recorded in the Jan. 6, 1988, issue by Billie Jines: “It was born Jan. 1, 1966, ushered into the world by James (Jim) and Marge Edgmon. then known as the Pea Ridge Graphic, the paper was published that first year by the Edgmons and their teen-age children in the basement of their home in Springdale.
Billie Jines wrote a feature a week for the newspapers run by the Edgmons.
Earle and Billie Jines bought the paper. “We did buy the paper — stripped. That is, for the price we paid, we received a secondclass mailing permit, membership in the Arkansas Press Association and about 370 subscribers. The
purchase date was Jan. 1, 1967, the day the paper was 1 year old.”
The first office was shared with
City Hall in the building immediately north of the main facilities of Sisco Funeral Home.
On Friday, July 13, 1967, the Jines moved to a house on North Curtis Avenue.
“The unsealed garage was turned into the newspaper shop and the glass-in breezeway sufficed as an office. Here the paper was published until April 1973, when we moved the news operation into the remodeled barn in the back yard,” Jines wrote.
There the paper was published by three other owners.
On Feb. 25, 1976, the Jines sold the Graphic Scene to Howell and Donna Spencer Medders of Rogers.
On Sept. 1, 1978, the Medders sold the paper to E.B. (Jack) and Mary Lou Beisner.
In June 1985, Jack suffered a heart attack, was later to resume limited work on the paper, then failed steadily in health until his death Jan. 22, 1986.
Mary Lou carried on the paper with help from a competent staff until after Jack’s death. Their son, E. Calvin Beisner, moved here from Colorado Springs and assumed the position as editor while Mary Lou remained publisher.
On Nov. 25, 1987, Mary Lou sold the paper, which the Beisners had renamed first the Pea Ridge Country Times and later the Times of Northeast Benton County.
The new owners were Mike and Barbara Freeman. The Freemans moved the newspaper form the Jines’ barn to an office in Battlefield Center and then to an office on Lee Town Road.
In March of 1999, the Freemans sold The Times of Northeast Benton County to Community Publishers Inc. (CPI), a locally owned group of newspapers based in Bentonville. CPI named Becki Tyson to be managing editor and Jeff Thacker as general manager. April 7, 1999, was the first issue published by CPI.
Since Vol. 1, No. 1, more than 2,869 issues have been published.
And, to quote Mrs. Jines: “And since that time, a generation of people have been born in northeast Benton County and have grown into adulthood not knowing a time in their lives when this newspaper did not exist.”