our birthday

Greetings all.
The Traveler will turn 138 Saturday.
We are planning a small celebration by giving a little something back to the community.
Several local merchants will have special papers at their location Saturday morning. These are regular papers, but with a special page added, and only available through this promotion.

There will be an advertisement for a special deal for subscription rates. This will be for either new subscriptions and renewals.

Also, we will put special prize coupons in some of the papers. These will be coupons for free classified ads and even better subscription deals.

We like to mark milestones such as birthdays. Of course the round numbers get more attention. I suppose we will do something bigger for 140.

The Traveler is the oldest continuous running business in Arkansas City. In fact, we are older than Arkansas City.

Like most towns being settled in the days after the Civil War, they started a newspaper even before the town got started.
A group of 10-15 men came here and started the Arkansas City Town Company.
The final group came here from Emporia, but some of them had started in Manhattan and even Illinois.

That group included the guy who started the Traveler. Buckskin Joe was the scout that led the party.

The Traveler may have started as a weekly, but soon became a daily paper. It is kind of amazing to think that the original settling party brought a printing press along with them.

There were other settlements in the area. The original settlement, even before Buckskin Joe and company showed up, was the spot where the Walnut River feeds into the Arkansas River. They soon saw flooding and realized it was no place for a permanent settlement and moved upland.

Anyway, that special paper will have the history of the Traveler in it, written by Foss Farrar. Foss is one of the best historical writers I have ever met. I am sure it will be an interesting read.

Thats all for now.

Selah

James