It happened quite suddenly.
A decision was made that the city couldn't maintain two daily newspapers, supported by the same company.
So we put the last edition of the Wanganui Herald to bed on Saturday, June 20, 1986. The following Tuesday the first edition of the Midweek Herald came off the presses
in the old Chronicle building in Rutland St.
The transition from a six-day-a-week evening paper to a community giveaway published every Tuesday (with a weekend edition coming out every Friday) marked a signal change in the city's newspaper world.
Until the Midweek appeared the city had been served by two papers - the morning daily the Chronicle and the Herald which came out mid-afternoon. Both were served by hard-working staff but we all knew that this was not going to continue.
I'd started on the Chronicle and later took on the role of Herald chief sub-editor at a time when the company was working hard to keep the Herald alive. We redesigned the paper in a bid to revive what was a flagging enterprise. To their credit management let us give it our best shot.
Were we saddened to see the Herald slip away? Of course we were. Some had worked for that masthead longer than I, and for them it was especially tough. For everyone on that team - the reporters, photographers and sub-editors, the printers, ad reps and circulation staff - it was an emotional moment.
In its wake rose Midweek. It started with an editorial team of five and was printed as a broadsheet paper. That first edition - June 23, 1986 - ran to 24 pages. For all intents and purposes it was an evening paper reincarnate. But time has brought significant change. It's a tabloid edition now, published every Wednesday and put together by a reporting team of one - Paul Brooks.
The point is that despite the loss of the evening paper, Midweek has been a very special and worthy replacement; a newsy, folksy weekly paper which has community at its heart.
And it has been with us for 30 years. That speaks volumes of the little paper that could.
