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Orlando Sentinel Executive Editor Roger Simmons. (Staff)<\/p>\nDear Readers,<\/p>\n
Happy New Year everyone! And happy 150th birthday to the Orlando Sentinel, which today kicks off a year-long celebration of our sesquicentennial.<\/p>\n
This is your invitation to join our 12-month party because we wouldn\u2019t be here today without you \u2013 our loyal readers, subscribers and advertisers. We are humbled by your ongoing support.<\/p>\n
Over the past century and a half, we\u2019ve reported hundreds of thousands of stories about our community, region, nation and world. From triumphs to tragedies, from the serious to the absurd, from important presidential visits to the head-scratching antics of Florida Man \u2013 we\u2019ve covered it all.<\/p>\n
Over the next 12 months, we\u2019re going to be looking back at some of the key events and topics that helped shape Orlando over the past 150 years and our coverage of those subjects, using our archives. You\u2019ll see our first \u201cSentinel 150 Spotlight\u201d report in this Sunday\u2019s newspaper and on OrlandoSentinel.com. We\u2019ll also provide details about the first of many community events we\u2019ll be producing this year related to our spotlight topics.<\/p>\n
Orlando Sentinel Executive Editor Roger Simmons. (Staff)<\/p>\n
From now through December, we\u2019re also going to do something we rarely do \u2013 report on ourselves. The 150-year story of the Sentinel includes as many twists and turns as an Orlando theme park rollercoaster. Today\u2019s newspaper is the result of the creation and merger (plus a couple of divorces) of several Orlando publications over the years.<\/p>\n
Sentinel, Star and Reporter have been our primary names over the past 150 years. It all started on June 6, 1876.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the day the first copy of Orlando\u2019s first newspaper was printed by Rufus Russell. We were known as the Orange County Reporter then, and we were created because Russell believed the newly incorporated town of Orlando should have its own newspaper after seeing its population boom from 75 in 1875 to 200 in 1876.<\/p>\n
The Reporter was printed once a week on a hand-operated press in a wooden building in what would become downtown Orlando. But the going was tough for the newspaper with so few residents and businesses around then. Russell sold the Reporter after two years, and another sale quickly followed to a man named Mahlon Gore.<\/p>\n
A well-regarded newspaperman, Gore arrived in Orlando in 1880 \u2013 and almost immediately regretted his decision.<\/p>\n
He had traveled from Iowa to Sanford and then had to walk to Orlando. \u201cThe sand was deep and the last end of the road stretched out unaccountably long,\u201d Gore recounted in a 1908 interview.<\/p>\n
After two days\u2019 of hiking, he stumbled across another human in the Central Florida scrub, and he asked for directions to Orlando.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe man on horseback looked me over for several seconds \u2026 and then replied, \u2018Why you damn fool, you\u2019re in Orlando now!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Gore was standing at what today is the downtown intersection of Livingston Street and Magnolia Avenue \u2013\u00a0 but it looked a lot different then.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were just two houses in sight,\u201d Gore said. \u201cI had come 1,400 miles to get to Orlando; I wanted to go home right then.\u201d<\/p>\n
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The Orange County Reporter office is shown in downtown Orlando in this 1884 photograph. (Sentinel Archives)<\/p>\n
Fortunately for us, he stayed and helped give the Orange County Reporter a strong financial and journalistic footing. He also became one of the city\u2019s founding fathers, being elected Orlando\u2019s mayor from 1884-87 and having a well-traveled downtown street named in his honor.<\/p>\n
Gore is just one in a collection of colorful characters from the Sentinel\u2019s past whom we\u2019re eager to introduce to today\u2019s readers throughout the year. We also plan to update you on what some popular Sentinel journalists from the past are doing today.<\/p>\n
But what\u2019s a birthday celebration without a few presents?<\/p>\n
We\u2019ve published a keepsake book, \u201cOrlando Sentinel 150th Anniversary Edition,\u201d featuring 150 of our notable front pages from the past 150 years. You can purchase a copy on our website at OrlandoSentinel.com\/150book<\/a><\/p>\n