Featured Image: Published by the Opelousas News Company, Inc. the Clarion-News printed weekly from 1929 until 1951 when it became the Eunice New Era and Clarion News, a paper published in Eunice.
CAROLA LILLIE HARTLEY
Publisher and Contributing Writer
As stated, many times before, Opelousas had so many newspapers over its centuries of existence it is known as the Graveyard of Newspapers. I don’t think any other town in Louisiana can say they had more. It is an interesting part of Opelousas history.
Over the years, historiographers began to understand the importance of the newspaper industry to the history of small towns across America. Those papers recorded the town’s history through the events and activities they reported, daily, weekly and so on. In 1935 as part of Works Progress Administration (WPA), a New Deal program designed by the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Federal Writers’ Project was created to provide jobs for out-of-work writers. Some writers were hired to do a study of newspapers in America that included those in Louisiana and Opelousas.[1] The 1940 report on the papers of Louisiana that was produced from this project listed 15 newspapers in Opelousas from 1827 through 1939, however, since that time we have discovered more that were not recorded by the writer’s project.
What we now know is from the first newspaper, the Opelousas Gazette (1827), to the end of the 19th century, Opelousas had 15 newspapers. Additional papers were added during the beginning of the 20th century and by 1939, during the time of the Federal Writers’ Project, Opelousas had 28 known newspapers. Four more were added during the later 20th century, into the 21st century and through this year. So, what we know today about Opelousas newspaper history is 32 newspapers have published in our town since it existed. And there could have been more.[2]
One of the newspapers operating in Opelousas from the end of the 1920s until 1951 was the Clarion-News, the subject of this article.
The Clarion-News
The first issue of the Clarion-News was published in Opelousas on Thursday, January 3, 1929. That paper was a consolidation of two papers, the Clarion-Progress and the Opelousas News. That consolidation was done immediately after a fire destroyed the office and building of the Clarion-Progress, located on Main Street next door to Bordelon Motor Company, on Saturday, December 8, 1928.
The Clarion-News publisher was the Opelousas News Company, Inc. In 1934, the Board of Directors of that company included A. B. Reed, President; J. N. Langford, Vice-president; James H. Prados, Secretary-Treasurer; Robert Fields, Isaac Litton and W. H. Reed, board members. J. N. Langford was Editor. The office of the Clarion-News, Opelousas News Company, Inc. was located at 134 East Bellevue Street in downtown Opelousas.
In 1934, the Opelousas News Company, Inc. purchased the other Opelousas newspaper at that time, the Opelousas Herald (1929). After that time, the Clarion-News was a weekly paper, while its sister paper, the Opelousas Herald, became a semi-weekly paper, both published by the Opelousas News Company, Inc. from the Bellevue Street office.
The town papers continued to operate in Opelousas for several years. When the Daily World was started in 1939, Opelousas had three newspapers, one a daily (Daily World), one a semi-weekly (Opelousas Herald), and one a weekly (Clarion-News).
During this period, the newspaper that was in business the longest was the Clarion-News, which started out as the St. Landry Clarion in the 1890s and evolved into the paper it had become at that time. Recognizing its importance to Opelousas and Louisiana history, in March and April of 1951, the Louisiana State University Microfilm department recorded a complete file from the first issue of the St. Landry Clarion in 1890 through the 1951 issues of the Clarion-News. It took five working weeks for the project to be completed, with over 32,000 pages of Clarion print filmed.[3]
The End of an Era in Opelousas Newspaper History
In October of 1951, the Clarion-News, issued by the Opelousas News Company, Inc., was sold along with its sister newspaper The Opelousas Herald, to the Eunice New Era, published by Matt Vernon. The New Era eventually became the Eunice News that is operating in Eunice, LA today.
The Sunday, October 7, 1951, issue of the Daily World ran a front-page story stating an agreement had been reached for the sale of the Opelousas News Company, publishers of the Clarion-News and the Opelousas Herald, local weekly and semi-weekly newspapers, to the Tri-Parish Publishing Company of Eunice. The announcement of the sale was made jointly by A. B. Reed, Sr., president and publisher of the Opelousas firm, and Matthew Vernon, president and publisher of the Eunice company as purchaser.
Mr. Vernon also announced in the same article that he made arrangements with the Daily World to continue to supply the paid-in-advance subscribers of the two Opelousas newspapers with the Daily World until their subscriptions expire. As part of the agreement, the Daily World also got the files of the Opelousas Herald.
So, with the publication of the Friday, October 5, 1951, edition of the Opelousas Herald, the Opelousas News Company suspended publication, and subscribers of both the Clarion-News and the Opelousas Herald newspapers began receiving the Daily World in lieu of the other two papers. That was done until the subscribers subscriptions expired.
Vernon also said that he would combine The New Era with the Clarion-News, the oldest newspaper in St. Landry Parish that was being published at that time. Arrangements were made with the Daily World for the continuation, on a combined basis of the name of the Opelousas Herald.
Thursday, October 4, 1951, was the final publication of the Clarion-News. It was edited by J. N. Langford since it was combined with the Opelousas News in 1928. Langford was a part owner of the firm along with Reed. Langford also edited the Opelousas Herald since the company purchased that paper in 1934, until just a few months prior when it was edited by A. B. Reed, Jr.
At the beginning of November in 1951, the office of the Clarion-News and Opelousas Herald on Bellevue Street was closed, and the contents moved to the Eunice New Era office in Eunice. The items moved included the 30-ton Duplex Webb press, taken away on Saturday, November 10, 1951. Moving that press was not easy. Originally the press used by the Opelousas Herald Newspaper, was in the Clarion-News office since 1934 when the Clarion-News, operated by Reed and Langford, acquired the Opelousas Herald.
The Daily World of November 11, 1951 ran an article on its front page about the closing of the Clarion-News and Opelousas Herald newspaper office. The article stated one of St. Landry’s oldest institutions — 59 years old — faded into history when equipment from the two newspapers were moved to offices of the Eunice New Era.
The article called the newspaper office on East Bellevue Street “the bee-hive of activity, humming with machinery and teletype, staffs grinding out the happenings of work, state, parish and local news during its day.” It called it an empty shell as the last of the equipment was taken out of the office as old employees watched on Saturday, November 10, 1951.
One of the old employees who was there to witness the removal of the old press was Miss Daisy Edwards, one of the first women to operate the linotype in Southwest Louisiana. Miss Edwards was related to the paper in its infancy, when it was the St. Landry Clarion with Raymond Breaux as Editor during the 1890s. That paper had a colorful history; it fought the battles of politicians in St. Landry; it recorded the every-day happenings of life and death in and about St. Landry’ it made it press runs weekly for 60 consecutive years.[4]
Sale of the Clarion-News and Opelousas Herald dissolved a staff that had worked together more like a family than employer and employee. Under terms of an agreement between Reed and Langford, Mr. Langford retained the two-story building that housed the two newspapers which he planned to lease. Mr. Langford also operated an antique shop after selling the newspaper.
Besides Miss Edwards, the longest-term employees of the Clarion-News were R. L. “Bosco” Wyble, James Bourdier (who was already deceased at the time it was sold) and Lawrence M. Andrepont, whose terms of service numbered from 25 to over 30 years with the paper. Wyble retired to his farm for a few years, and later worked at the Daily World.
Lawrence M. Andrepont went to Eunice for several weeks after the press was moved to show the pressmen there how to operate the Duplex press. On his return to Opelousas, he went to work for the Daily World job printing department. In 1952, along with James Bullara, he opened Andrepont Printing, that continues to operate in Opelousas today.
A. B. Reed, Jr, who had joined the paper as advertising manager following his graduation at the close of WWII, accepted a position with KSLO Radio in Opelousas. Mrs. James Prados also went to work for the radio station, while Rita Favre married Leslie Guidry and retired from the newspaper business.[5]
Thus another chapter in Opelousas newspaper history came to an end, and the Clarion-News joined others in that Graveyard of Newspapers.
[1] Louisiana Newspapers 1794-1940, A union list of Louisiana newspapers files available in offices of publishers, libraries, and private collections in Louisiana prepared by The Louisiana Historical Records Survey Division of Community Service Programs, Work Project Administration – Hill Memorial Library, Louisiana State University, October 1941.
[2] The Opelousas Gazette is the first paper we know of in Opelousas, but there may have been another one also during that time. JohnThistlethwaite, one of the founders of the Daily World and its publisher for many years, stated he saw proof that in the 1820s the Opelousas Gazette referred several times to a competitor newspaper in Opelousas, against whom they fought for the parish printing. But that paper was never named. (From an article in the Daily World, published on December 23, 1955.)
[3] Clarion-News, Opelousas, LA, Thursday, April 26, 1951, Page one.
[4] Daily World, Opelousas, LA, Sunday, November 11, 1951, Page one.
[5] Daily World, Opelousas, LA, Sunday, November 11, 1951, Page one.
