Bakersfield Mayor Karen Goh asked listeners to travel with her. Take a trip to August 1866, when the world\u2019s first roller-skating rink opened in Newport, R.I. Travel to that August, when President Andrew Johnson issued a proclamation declaring the end of the Civil War.<\/p>\n
And right here in Kern County, Goh said, the Havilah Weekly Courier debuted its first edition on Aug. 18, 1866. Over the years the newspaper was rechristened The Kern County Californian, The Daily Californian and in 1907, The Bakersfield Californian.<\/p>\n
Today, the newspaper celebrates 160 years of producing the first rough draft of history through Clippings, an exhibit of important front pages, poignant photos made by award-winning photojournalists, tools of the trade, The Californian\u2019s 1923 Ford Model-T panel truck and more, presented in the galleries of The Arts Council of Kern.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor 160 years journalism has given our community a witness,\u201d the mayor said at a Thursday news conference introducing the exhibit. Journalists have documented the triumphs, challenges, people and moments that have shaped Kern County, Goh noted.<\/p>\n
The free exhibit opened to the public Friday evening, and it will continue to be open for viewing from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday until Sept. 10 at the Arts Council, 1020 18th St.<\/p>\n
Council Executive Director Jeannette Richardson highlighted the partnership between journalism and the arts, explaining the exhibit was months in the making.<\/p>\n
Staff from the newspaper carefully prepared a walk through the newspaper\u2019s history, which is also Bakersfield\u2019s and Kern County\u2019s history.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am super excited to be able to be able to celebrate this anniversary,\u201d Californian Vice President and Publisher Terri Leifeste said, noting that the best that can ascertained, The Californian is the oldest continuously operating business in Kern County.<\/p>\n
While the newspaper has evolved \u2014 there are different ways of putting out the paper now than were used in 1866 \u2014 the mission endures.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are super proud of the work that we do every day and hopefully we will be doing it for a lot longer,\u201d Leifeste said. \u201cThat\u2019s our plan!\u201d<\/p>\n
Executive Editor Christine L. Peterson said the exhibit is bound to stir viewers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI invite all of Bakersfield to visit Clippings, to take in what they see, to feel emotions,\u201d Peterson said. \u201cI have a feeling there will be some people who are surprised by a front page, who will have a memory reignited about what they see. Whatever the reaction is, come experience what we have here and take it in.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s all about stories, and that\u2019s what the exhibit delivers to viewers, just as The Californian delivers those stories each day.<\/p>\n
Said Goh: \u201cCongratulations, The Bakersfield Californian, on 160 years of telling our story. Thank you Arts Council of Kern for helping us see that story in new and exciting ways. Bakersfield has always had a story to tell and for 160 years we\u2019ve been finding new ways to tell that. And that, indeed, is the sound of something better.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bakersfield Mayor Karen Goh asked listeners to travel with her. Take a trip to August 1866, when the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":433610,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[151,153,152],"class_list":["post-433609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bakersfield","tag-bakersfield","tag-bakersfield-headlines","tag-bakersfield-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=433609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/433610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=433609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=433609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=433609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}