Advance buys 102-year-old La Feria News

Last week, the 102-year-old La Feria News (Cameron County) published a front-page news feed that read — “The La Feria News Says Goodbye.”

Apparently, as part of an ongoing trend across the Rio Grande Valley, the state, the nation, another print-media outlet was closing its doors.

Along with the La Feria News, its sister publication, the Los Fresnos News, founded in 2005, was suffering the same fate.

According to the Oct. 29th story, the La Feria News, founded in 1923, was shutting down because there simply wasn’t enough ad revenue to stay afloat. Too many readers, advertisers had gravitated to digital news, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, blogs, Substack, leaving behind the traditional print newspaper.

Indeed, the newspaper numbers don’t look great.

“So why did you buy the La Feria News?”

I’m getting there but first let me pour another cup of coffee.

Keep in mind, though, vinyl records were once thought to be extinct, but have made a comeback, recently outselling CDs for the first time since 1987, even though both formats are dwarfed by streaming revenue in the overall music industry (Source: NPR).

This comeback is driven by factors like younger generations embracing physical media and the desire for tangibility in a digital world.

It’s the same reason, I think, that print media will never disappear.

For breaking news, print can’t compete with digital platforms. But for a deep dive into local news, opinion columns, sports photos, school events, some readers still prefer print much like book lovers still prefer the feel of a real book over a spineless e-edition.

The Numbers Decline

Over the past year alone, approximately 136 newspapers in the U.S. have closed up shop, according to a recent report published by Northwestern University.

Since 2005, the number of newspapers across the U.S. has dropped from 7,325 to 4,490, with weekly newspapers bearing the brunt of the decline.

Today, two newspapers per week are shutting down, according to the Northwestern report.

Twenty years ago, according to the same report, 365,460 people worked at newspapers compared to the current number, 91,550.

When the U.S. was founded, its Founding Fathers (women were the real brains) thought that a free press was so important to a democracy, a free republic, that the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted it special protections.

“Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.”

Radio and TV affiliates need an FCC license to operate, so the feds still have them under their thumb to some extent.

Podcasts as well. Some people create a channel on YouTube, work years to build a free subscription base of two million, and overnight, the digital giant, owned by Google, shuts them down without explanation. And none is ever given. The content creator simply upset the wrong person, group of people, and poof, all their hard work is for naught.

Newspapers, though, have the freedom to report the news as we see fit, beholden to no one but our readers and advertisers.

Early Americans had experienced censorship and propaganda under British rule. As a consequence, they wanted the press on U.S. soil to be able to report on government actions freely so the public could hold leaders accountable, without fear or favor.

Thomas Jefferson had his own take on what newspapers meant for a free republic when he wrote down these words in 1787:

“The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.”

How far we’ve come when today, some politicians are now calling media, “The enemy of the people.”

Uh, don’t think so. It’s not the free press that’s racked up a national debt of $38 trillion and counting.

The La Feria News

It was Ruben Acosta, the talented guy who’s been at the Advance News Journal for 37 years, helping my wife, Jan, and me keep the newspaper afloat through good times and bad, who first told us last week that the La Feria News was shutting down.

A newspaper that dates back to 1923? A newspaper that’s 102 years old? Going out of business?

Stop the press.

Can’t have that.

The Advance couldn’t rescue both papers owned by the former publishers, La Feria and Los Fresnos, but we could at least keep one up and running.

Actually, La Feria’s newspaper of record dates back to 1913 under its initial banner, the La Feria Leader. In 1923, another publisher launched the La Feria News, which has been in continuous publication ever since, managing to weather the Great Depression, the Great Recession, and all the economic ups and downs seen over the past 102 years, including two world wars.

So, the idea that the internet, digital platforms, smart phones were going to kill off a print newspaper more than a century old, no, we weren’t going to let that happen if we could save it. Turns out, we could.

Enough people still prefer print media. Whether it’s a newspaper, a book, or a magazine. And for those who lean toward digital, both the Advance News Journal and the La Feria News have online platforms where we publish news and commentary.

Plus, we have the best newspaper designer around in our opinion, P.J. Hernandez, who also writes news and sports.

So, onward and upward.

The Advance News Journal founded in 1978; The La Feria News, founded in 1923.

Now a twin combo.

Does it feel good to resurrect a 102-year-old newspaper from what was to be its final issue last week?

Darn right it does.

Where there is a will, there is a way.