The Roanoke Times

The Roanoke Times

The July 27, 2005 front page of
The Roanoke Times
Type Daily newspaper
Format Broadsheet
Owner(s) Berkshire Hathaway
Publisher Terry Jamerson
Founded 1886
Language English
Headquarters 201 West Campbell Avenue
Roanoke, Virginia 24010-2491
 United States
Circulation 65,000 Morning
85,000 Sunday (as of 2013)[1]
Website roanoke.com

The Roanoke Times is the primary newspaper in Southwestern Virginia and is based in Roanoke, Virginia, United States. It is published by Berkshire Hathaway. In addition to its headquarters in Roanoke, it maintains a bureau in Christiansburg, covering the eastern New River Valley and Virginia Tech.

According to the 2011 Scarborough “Ranker Report,” The Roanoke Times ranks fifth in the country in terms of percentage of adults reading a newspaper on weekdays in that newspaper's coverage area.

History

The Roanoke Daily Times began publication in 1886. The paper's original owner, M. H. Claytor, eventually added a companion evening newspaper, The Roanoke Evening News. In 1909, he sold the paper to a group headed by banker J. B. Fishburn. The Fishburn group bought the Roanoke Evening World in 1913, merging it with the Evening News and changing its name to the Roanoke World-News. At the same time, Times-World Corporation was formed as the owner of both papers.

By 1931, Times-World Corporation had expanded into broadcasting with the purchase of WDBJ (now WFIR), Roanoke's first radio station. It eventually spawned an FM station (now WSLC) and a television station (which still has the WDBJ calls). In 1969, Times-World merged with Landmark Communications, which sold off the broadcasting properties and kept the papers. In 1991, the newspaper became known as The Roanoke Times & World-News when the company stopped publication of the afternoon World-News. The paper dropped the latter part of its name in 1995.[2]

Landmark started shopping its newspaper properties in 2008 and sold the Times to Berkshire Hathaway's BH Media Group in 2013.[3] This made the Times a sister publication to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, as well as the News & Advance of Lynchburg, the other major paper serving the Roanoke/Lynchburg media market.

Notable stories

As the major daily newspaper for Roanoke and much of Southwest Virginia, The Roanoke Times has extensively covered news events from the area that have gained national media exposure. Some examples include:

Notable writers, columnists and editors

References

  1. "The Roanoke Times". BH Media Group. Archived from the original on 2013-05-31.
  2. Matt Chittum (May 30, 2013). "Steady ownership has marked The Roanoke Times' history". Retrieved June 5, 2013.
  3. John Reid Blackwell (May 31, 2013). "Berkshire Hathaway buys The Roanoke Times". Richmond Times-Dispatch. Retrieved June 5, 2013.
  4. Smith, J. David. "Walter Scott Copeland (1856–1928)". Encyclopedia Virginia. Retrieved 24 June 2015.

External links

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