{{Short description|Newspaper for Point Pleasant, West Virginia}} {{Use mdy dates|date=February 2025}} {{Infobox newspaper | name = Point Pleasant Register | logo = | logo_size = | logo_alt = Front page of the first issue of The Weekly Register | image = The Weekly Register 6 March 1862, page 1.jpg | image_size = 220px | image_alt = | caption = The first page of the first issue of ''The Weekly Register'' of Point Pleasant, (West) Virginia. | motto = | type = weekly newspaper (1862–1916), daily newspaper (1895–1902, 1916–2022) | format = | owner = AIM Media Midwest | founder = George W. Tippett | publisher = | president = | editor = | chief_editor = | deputy_editor = | associate_editor = | managing_editor = | general_manager = | news_editor = | campus_editor = | campus_chief = | metro_editor = | metro_chief = | opinion_editor = | photo_editor = | staff_writers = | founded = {{start date and age|1862|3|6}} | political_position = | language = English | ceased_publication = 2022 | relaunched = | headquarters = | publishing_city = Point Pleasant, West Virginia | publishing_country = United States | circulation = 2,216 | circulation_date = 2016 | circulation_ref = <ref>{{Cite book|url=https://wvpress.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/2016-directory-print-062916-small.pdf|title=2016 West Virginia Press Association Newspaper Directory|last=|first=|publisher=West Virginia Press Association|year=2016|isbn=|location=|pages=}}</ref> | readership = | sister_newspapers = | ISSN = | oclc = | RNI = | website = {{URL|mydailyregister.com}} | free = }}
The '''''Point Pleasant Register''''' was a newspaper serving Point Pleasant and Mason County, West Virginia from 1862 to 2022. Circulation was limited to Mason County and nearby areas. The newspaper was founded by George W. Tippett as '''''The Weekly Register''''' in 1862,<ref name="HHH Mason Newspapers">"Newspapers", in ''Hardesty's Biographical Atlas of Mason County, West Virginia'', H. H. Hardesty & Co., New York, Toledo, and Chicago (1882).</ref> many years before becoming a daily publication, known as ''The Point Pleasant Register'' beginning in 1909.
==History== ===Precursors=== Several ephemeral newspapers preceded the ''Register'' at Point Pleasant. The first of these was ''The West Virginian'', published by Charles W. Hoy and William Peoples, beginning in 1845. This paper ceased publication after about a year, when Peoples moved the printing press to Gallipolis, Ohio.<ref name="HHH Mason Newspapers"/> Another newspaper was published from 1852 to 1854, under the titles ''Weekly Bulletin'' and ''The Western Messenger'', subsequently purchased by the United Brethren Publishing Company and continued as ''The Virginia Telescope'' until 1856, then ''The Virginia Messenger'', published by D. S. Van Matre, proprietor of ''Slasher's Monthly'', until 1857.<ref name="HHH Mason Newspapers"/> ''The Independent Republican'' was published by James Hutchinson and Lewis Wetzel from 1854 to 1861, when mail delivery was halted early in the American Civil War, and its printing press and office equipment were sold.<ref name="HHH Mason Newspapers"/>
===Establishment=== thumb|left|upright=0.5|Declararation of the Register's original purpose. On March 6, 1862, George Ways Tippett, who had been foreman of the ''Independent Republican'', published the first issue of ''The Weekly Register'', a weekly newspaper issued each Thursday.<ref name="HHH Mason Newspapers"/><ref>''The Weekly Register'', Vol. I, No. 1 (6 March 1862).</ref><ref name="WV Encyclopedia">Harold Malcolm Forbes, "Newspapers", in ''The West Virginia Encyclopedia'', West Virginia Humanities Council (2006), pp. 530, 531.</ref> The ''Register'' was housed in a frame building on the lower end of Main Street in Point Pleasant, with subscriptions sold for $1 per year, to be paid in advance.<ref name="Blessing">Roy Blessing, "A History of Point Pleasant Register" in ''History of Mason County, West Virginia 1987'', County Heritage, Inc. (1987, 2005).</ref> Tippett served as owner and editor of the ''Register'' during the Civil War, selling it to W. D. Mansfield of Athens, Ohio in 1865.<ref name="HHH Mason Newspapers"/> The following year, Mansfield sold the paper to E. M. Fitzgerald, formerly the city editor.<ref name="HHH Mason Newspapers"/><ref name="Blessing"/> With the help of J. A. Shearer, who succeeded Fitzgerald as city editor, Tippett repurchased the ''Register'' in 1867.<ref name="HHH Mason Newspapers"/><ref name="Blessing"/> The ''Register'' would prove to be an exception to the usual pattern of early West Virginia newspapers, most of which failed within a few years of their establishment.<ref name="WV Encyclopedia"/>
===Tippett era=== thumb|George W. Tippett, founder of the ''Weekly Register'', {{circa}} 1900. Tippett continued to publish and edit the paper each Thursday, through the end of the sixteenth volume on January 31, 1878. Beginning with the next issue, the ''Register'' was published on Wednesdays, with Tippett citing the need to go to press a day earlier in order to meet the mails.<ref>''The Weekly Register'', 31 Jan. 1878, p. 3.</ref> Interviewed for ''Hardesty's Biographical Atlas of Mason County, West Virginia'' (1882), Tippett stated that the ''Register'' had only missed six issues in its twenty-one years of publication.<ref name="HHH Mason Newspapers"/> On January 18, 1895, ''The Weekly Register'' was joined by ''The Daily Register'', a daily newspaper also published by Tippett, at the price of 25¢ per month.<ref>''The Weekly Register'', 22 Jan. 1902.</ref>
George W. Tippett died May 19, 1902, aged sixty-six, forty years after beginning the ''Register''.<ref>''The Weekly Register'', 21 May 1902.</ref> His death resulted in the suspension of ''The Daily Register'' on June 30, 1902, after nearly eight-and-a-half years of publication.<ref>''The Weekly Register'', 2 July 1902, p. 1.</ref> His son, F. B. Tippett, succeeded him as editor until the ''Weekly Register's'' final issue, dated January 27, 1909. At this time the ''Register's'' business failed, and without warning the paper ceased publication for about two months.<ref>''The Weekly Register'', 27 Jan. 1909.</ref><ref name="PPR Republished">"Point Pleasant Register to be Republished", in ''The Point Pleasant Register'', 7 Apr. 1909, p. 1 (reprinted from ''The Charleston Gazette'').</ref>
===Re-establishment=== On April 6, 1909, the Register Publishing Company was incorporated with a capital investment of $25,000, having purchased the assets of ''The Weekly Register'' from J. S. Spencer on March 27.<ref name="PPR Republished"/><ref name="New Register 7 Apr 1909">"The Register", in ''The Point Pleasant Register'', 7 Apr. 1909, p. 4.</ref> The new owners, none of whom had been connected with the previous version, announced their intention of publishing a weekly Democratic-leaning newspaper, at a time when all other papers in Mason County were Republican, under the title of ''The Point Pleasant Register''. The company assumed responsibility for the ''Weekly Register's'' subscribers.<ref name="PPR Republished"/><ref name="New Register 7 Apr 1909"/> W. C. Whaley, one of the new owners, was appointed general manager, with subscriptions at $1 per year, to be paid in advance.<ref name="New Register 7 Apr 1909"/>
By 1916, R. B. Bell succeeded as editor and general manager of the ''Register'', which resumed daily publication, and operated on the second story of a hardware store on Fifth and Main Streets in Point Pleasant.<ref name="Blessing"/><ref name="WV Encyclopedia"/> The company re-incorporated on July 24, 1930, and moved into a brick building on Fifth Street. W. Cleveland Bowie served as editor from 1931 to 1941, when he was succeeded by Edward Swint, editor from 1941 to 1965. In 1951, the building housing the ''Register'' was badly damaged by fire, and the paper moved into a new location at the corner of Second and Main Streets.<ref name="Blessing"/>
Swint was followed as editor by J. Knox Dye, John Samsell, William J. Dempsey, and Robert Wingett. In 1969, the ''Register'' became part of the Ohio Valley Publishing Company, which merged with Multimedia, Inc. in 1977. Judy Morgan, previously the news editor, became the first female editor of the ''Point Pleasant Register'' in 1985.<ref name="Blessing"/>
===Late period=== By the 2010s, the newspaper was owned by Heartland Publications, an imprint of Ohio Community Media, which merged with Impressions Media to form Civitas Media in 2012.<ref>{{cite web |accessdate=April 10, 2017|url= http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20120911006840/en/Versa-Capital-Announces-Formation-Civitas-Media-LLC |author=Business Wire | title= Versa Capital Announces the Formation of Civitas Media, LLC }}</ref> Civitas Media sold the ''Register'' to AIM Media Midwest in 2017.<ref>{{Cite web| title = Quarterly Updates - 2nd Quarter 2017| work = Dirks, Van Essen & Murray| accessdate = 2017-10-28| date = 2017-06-30| url = http://dirksvanessen.com/articles/view/225/2nd-quarter-2017/}}</ref> The ''Register'' continued to publish under its own name, following the schedule of publishing morning editions from Tuesday to Friday, and a "weekend" edition delivered at mid-day on Saturday. At this period, the ''Register'' primarily covered local events, with broader news coverage provided by the ''Huntington Herald-Dispatch'' and the ''Charleston Gazette-Mail'', which circulated widely throughout the county. About 2022, the ''Register'' ceased to be published as a separate paper, being folded into the ''River Cities Tribune & Register'', along with newspapers from Gallipolis and Pomeroy, Ohio.
==Archives== Various libraries preserve archives of ''The Weekly Register'' and ''Point Pleasant Register''. Although incomplete, the West Virginia State Archives has issues of the ''Register'' on microfilm, from the first issue in 1862 to June 30, 2022.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://archive.wvculture.org/history/newspapers/mason.html |title=Newspapers on Microfilm: Mason County |author=<!--Not stated--> |date=2021 |website=West Virginia State Archives |publisher=West Virginia Department of Arts, Culture and History |access-date=6 October 2024 |quote=}}</ref> Some of the ''Register's'' archives can be viewed over the internet: a commercial website, Newspapers.com, has some, but not all extant issues of ''The Weekly Register'' from 1862 to 1909, and ''The Point Pleasant Register'' from 1909 and 1910. The Google News Archive has issues from 1986 to 1997, 1999 to 2002, and 2004.
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== *{{official website|https://www.wvnews.com/rivercities/}}
{{AIM Media}}
Category:Newspapers published in West Virginia Category:Point Pleasant, West Virginia