THE GREAT NEWSPAPER REVIVAL

When the EAGLE TIMES shut down, the VALLEY NEWS and the UNION LEADER newspapers attempted to make use of the opportunity to extend and increase their circulation in CLAREMONT(and surrounding area,no doubt) but in the wake of the apparent demise of the EAGLE, three other newspapers emerged:THE CLAREMONT CITY POST; THE COMPASS; AND THE CLAREMONT VILLAGER. As of this writing, these latter three are still existing despite the resurrection/revival of the EAGLE TIMES! In a period when newspapers and magazines are decreasing, downsizing, declining and ceasing to operate, future national trends, small papers,both in actual size and shape, and circulation that cater to specific communities will survive the rapid digitalization via the electronic media revolution that is reshaping all present institutions as well as government operations. Two of these papers in Claremont are free:CLAREMONT CITY POST & THE COMPASS and both depend on advertising and interest in them. THE POST was at first a single sheet,floded with print and color photos on both sides. It has since expanded into two full size sheets, making four sides total. It has, and rightly so, tended to focus on positive affairs and events in the Claremont area and has avoided the negative politics of the town for the most part and one might hope that they will shun all of this and continue to concentrate on the groups, people, and activities they have featured thus far. THE COMPASS has involved former EAGLE employees apparently and covers a a large area than merely Claremont. THE COMPASS should succeed or survive but it also faces,as do all the others,competition from other papers in Vermont and New Hampshire. THE CLAREMONT VILLAGER has on its staff Archie Mountain who also worked many years for the DAILY EAGLE(as the EAGLE TIMES was once known) and then started his own paper,THE NEWS LEADER( apaper to which I subscribed,incidentally). THE CLAREMONT VILLAGER, like the former NEWS LEADER, faces great competition from the EAGLE TIMES simply because most people who read the EAGLE and supported it before are too lazy to support the new publications, and out of habit, prefer the long familiar name to them of EAGLE TIMES to the courageous upstarts,even if two of them continue to be free! They somehow imagine a certainloyalty to the name EAGLE TIMES,which binds and obligates them to do so.