The Freeman Headlines Through 100 Years
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Any headline of The Freeman is meant to grab attention. “Headline” is originally a printers’ term that dates back to the 1890s, but it has evolved from being technical jargon to one that implies “important news.” While the word still is technical jargon in the newsroom, it has come to mean something of immediate and momentous relevance to the general public.
Headline is not simply another word for “title.” It screams out the story. It shouts significance and urgency: “This story is big! You have to know it now!”
Moreover, The Freeman headlines are more than just handles of “important news.” These are mini-documents of Cebuano history-in-themaking.
For this reason, The Freeman takes its headlines seriously. Deciding on the headline story for the following day’s issue is very serious business for The Freeman editors – then as now, and always. The editors argue… and then agree on which stories land on the paper’s page one, and which one to be the headline story.
Newspaper insiders everywhere may claim that what The Freeman editors do is standard practice among newspapers. Perhaps. Only that The Freeman editors fuss more about it.
The headline of any issue of The Freeman has gone through a stringent process. It’s about being careful – about being responsible – because The Freeman fully understands the effects that its headlines will have on the public mind. The Freeman wants to keep its reading communities updated and informed in the most objective and responsible way possible.
Today, on the occasion of the launch of The Freeman’s centennial celebration, the paper renews its commitment to “fair and fairless” journalism. In addition, it reaffirms its continuing effort for its headlines to be of stories that really matter in the lives of its readers – not for praise or recognition, but because it can be done. The look of The Freeman’s front page may have slightly varied through the years; it’s all simply cosmetics on the same guiding philosophy.