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A REPUTATION FOR EXCELLENCE
A History of the Aberdeen and Northern Counties Printing
Industry
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Northern Counties - Inverness
The Highland Printing
and Publishing Group Ltd
It was in 1880 that the Highland Temperance League was formed with
the aim of serving the Inverness and Oban areas. The lowering of
the tax on spirits earlier had created widespread alcoholic abuse,
particularly during the latter half of the century. One of the League’s
first steps to combat the ‘curse of Scotland’ was to launch
a newspaper and on 8 October 1883 the first issue of The Highland
News appeared. It was a four-page weekly, priced one penny. The
imprint made known it was ‘Printed every Monday morning by
Lewis Munro Dingwall, and published by him at 5 Castle Street Inverness’.
Under the masthead of the paper there appeared views of both Inverness
and Oban, as well as a sub-title ‘The Organ of the Highland
Temperance League’. A leader set out the aims of the news-paper
which were ‘To supply news principally gathered from all parts
of the Highlands on the only day of the secular week on which no
other newspaper is published in our midst and to assist in advancing
the moral and social well-being of the people’.
In John Noble’s Bibliography of Inverness News-papers and Periodicals
published in 1903, Munro is described as ‘conducting’
the paper with occasional contributions from friends engaged in
the temperance movement. It is improbable that Munro edited the
News as he had founded The Ross-shire Journal in Dingwall in 1875
and had there a dual role of editor and occasional reporter. It
is more likely he was no more that the contract printer and publisher
of The Highland News.
The first edition of the News was said to be a very ‘readable
product’, first columns of editorial matter on the front page
and an equal number of columns devoted to advertising. Surprisingly,
the temperance propaganda was limited, occupying only about one-third
of the total content of the newspaper.
Thirteen months after the launch, the imprint was altered to read
‘Printed for and published by Philip Macleod at the office
of The Highland News, 11 Castle Wynd, Inverness’. With the
change, in fact only the second and third pages of the paper began
to be printed in Inverness, the other two pages continuing to be
printed by Munro in Dingwall.
On 30 May 1885, the News ceased being published as the organ of
the Highland Temperance League. Instead, it announced it was now
serving all the northern counties. In June of the following year,
Macleod became proprietor and editor and the newspaper was both
printed and published in Inverness.
Macleod continued as owner until 1904 when he was joined by Edward
J. Taylor, who became editor, and James C. Stewart as director and
business manager. Two other members of the staff were William Grant
and his brother Duncan. The former was the Stornoway correspondent
for the News when, in 1916, the brothers had a serious dispute with
the owners over the printing and publishing of the first edition
of Lewis Roll of Honour. This resulted in them severing their connection
with the News and going off to found The Stornoway Gazette. It is
rather ironic that, when a new syndicate of local businessmen bought
The Highland News in 1933, they persuaded Duncan Grant to return
to the paper, first as joint managing director and subsequently
managing director of the company. The new owners modernised the
paper and installed a Cossar printing press to replace a flat-bed,
hand-fed letterpress machine.
In the first half of this century the local press in the Highlands
was largely operated by small independent units. The trend towards
larger groupings started in 1946 when The Highland News merged with
The North Star, Dingwall, both papers retaining their separate identities.
That same year this partnership bought The Caithness Courier and
shortly afterwards The Forres News. Thus the Highland News Group
came into existence with Alexander MacRae, former editor and proprietor
of The North Star, as managing director. In 1948 the News and The
Football Times became the first Highland newspapers to be printed
on a rotary press when new plant was installed in Hamilton Street,
Inverness.
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Volume 3 published 1996
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