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Southam Inc.
Canadian news agency
Canadian news agency
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| name | Southam Inc. |
| logo_upright | |
| type | Public |
| industry | News Media Chain |
| founded | 1904 |
| founder | William Southam |
| defunct | |
| fate | Sold |
| successor | Canwest |
| hq_location_city | Toronto |
| hq_location_country | Canada |
| area_served | Canada |
| key_people | Charles Lynch |
| products | Newspapers and newswires |
Southam Inc., also known as Southam News, Southam Newspapers, and Southam Newswire, was a media company and news agency in Canada. Company founder William Southam started as a paper boy for the London Free Press and eventually went on to acquire many prominent daily newspapers across Canada such as the Calgary Herald, Edmonton Journal, Ottawa Citizen, The Province and Winnipeg Tribune and created Southam Inc. in 1904 to run them.
Through a series of transactions with Thomson Newspapers and FP Publications Ltd. between 1979 and 1980, Southam acquired monopolies in the Victoria, Vancouver, Alberta, Ottawa and Montreal markets for its daily papers. These acquisitions and paper closings directly caused the Canadian government to call, in September 1980, a royal commission on Newspapers, informally known as the Kent Commission.
By the end of 1980s, Southam Inc. became Canada's largest newspaper chain, with daily papers in most major urban centres. Hollinger Inc. gained control of the company in 1996 and it was eventually broken up and sold to media conglomerate Canwest in 2000. The brand continued on until 2003, when Canwest retired it in favour of its own branding for its newspaper chain and newswire. Since 2010, many former Southam newspapers are now owned by Postmedia Network Inc.
History
William Southam was the main force behind the company that bears his name, to manage his growing newspaper empire. | access-date = 22 December 2024 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20241207065021/https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/southam-inc | archive-date = 7 December 2024 | url-status = live | access-date = 22 December 2024 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20240726200007/https://www.thespec.com/life/hamilton-region/a-newspaper-empire-began-with-the-spectator/article_14dc36b0-4e93-5e41-936c-a4c665ef27e0.html | archive-date = 26 July 2024
1904–1979: A leading Canadian chain
On March 11, 1904, Southam Limited was incorporated. | access-date = 31 December 2024 | access-date = 31 December 2024
Over the next 70-plus years, it grew into one of the largest newspaper chains in the country, with 17 daily newspapers and 56 community newspapers. As the newspaper chain expanded, the associated wire service, Southam News Service, was created and expanded with it.
1979–1980: Reshaping Canada's newspaper industry
When FP Publications Ltd. closed The Montreal Star – at one time, Canada's largest circulation newspaper until the 1950s – in September 1979, it started a chain reaction of consolidation within the Canadian newspaper industry. | access-date = 28 December 2024 | access-date = 27 December 2024 | url-access = subscription
The 1980s opened with Thomson Newspapers Ltd. buying, in January 1980, FB Publications Ltd. This transaction included its chain, Canadian Newspapers Limited Partnership, that at the time, owned Toronto's The Globe and Mail, the Winnipeg Free Press, two Alberta papers, and a 50 percent share of Pacific Press Ltd which controlled two of Victoria, British Columbia newspapers, The Daily Colonist and The Victoria Times. | access-date = 28 December 2024
In early April 1980, the FP Publications brand was retired, and merged with Thomson under the Thomson Newspapers brand. | access-date = 28 December 2024 | access-date = 28 December 2024
By June 1980, the ramifications of the Montreal Star closing and Thomson's acquisition of the Star's parent company, FP Publications began to emerge. Southam Inc. had to sell Thomson Newspapers one-third of Montreal's The Gazette to acquire the assets of the now closed Star paper. | access-date = 28 December 2024 | access-date = 28 December 2024
Southam decided to close The Winnipeg Tribune on August 27, 1980, and Thomson Newspapers bought its assets. | access-date = 22 December 2024 | access-date = 27 December 2024 | url-access = subscription
Critics of the largest consolidation in Canadian newspaper history, up to that time, called it a failure in the Canadian government's anti-combines legislation. | access-date = 27 December 2024 | access-date = 27 December 2024 | access-date = 27 December 2024
In 1981, Southam purchased, the three-day-a-week newspaper, the Kamloops News. | access-date = 22 December 2024 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20241207061513/https://www.upi.com/Archives/1981/07/30/Southam-Inc-one-of-Canadas-two-largest-newspaper-chains/2549365313600/ | archive-date = 7 December 2024 | url-status = live
1996–2000: Sale to Hollinger
Southam Newspapers was taken over by Hollinger Inc. in 1996, after Conrad Black gained a controlling stake in the company. | access-date = 22 December 2024 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20241207060339/https://www.spokesman.com/stories/1996/jun/02/conrad-black-gobbles-up-canadian-newspapers/ | archive-date = 7 December 2024 | url-status = live | access-date = 26 December 2024
2000–2003: Southam's demise
On November 15, 2000, the Southam Newspapers company was broken up with the print media holdings and the Southam Newspapers name being sold to media company Canwest. | access-date = 22 December 2024 | access-date = 26 December 2024 | access-date = 26 December 2024 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170415012241/https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/Canwest-sells-papers-to-transcontinental-for-255-million-1.340350 | archive-date = 15 April 2017 | url-status = live
| access-date = 25 December 2024
At the end of January 2003, Leonard Asper, Canwest's president and CEO announced that the Southam corporate name was to be retired, and Canwest branding would be used in its place. | access-date = 25 December 2024 | access-date = 27 December 2024
| access-date = 27 December 2024
2010: Postmedia buys Canwest
Although defunct for seven years, Southam's remnants were sold by Canwest on July 13, 2010, when its newspaper publishing division was spun off into a new company, Postmedia Network Ltd., led by National Post CEO, Paul Godfrey. | access-date = 22 December 2024 | access-date = 22 December 2024 | url-access = subscription | access-date = 23 December 2024 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20241223045851/https://www.thespec.com/business/shaw-communications-canadas-new-media-giant/article_bf585e53-f84a-5952-a115-04d60506e0e2.html | archive-date = 23 December 2024 | url-status = live | access-date = 23 December 2010 | access-date = 23 December 2024
Criticism
The Asper-owned Southam newspaper empire faced criticism when it fired Russell Mills as publisher of the Ottawa Citizen, allegedly for criticizing Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, who was a good friend of Izzy Asper. | access-date = 22 December 2024 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120301133013/http://www.globaljournalist.org/stories/2002/10/01/fired-canadian-publisher-superhero-of-free-press/ | archive-date = 1 March 2012 | url-status = dead | access-date = 31 December 2024 | url-access = subscription | access-date = 26 December 2024
References
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