Disgusted by publishers and editors who refused to cover important stories for fear of offending advertisers, the press baron E. W. Scripps rejected conventional wisdom and set out to prove that an ad-free newspaper could be profitable entirely on circulation. Duane C. S. Stoltzfus details the history of Scripps's innovative 1911 experiment, which began in Chicago amid great secrecy. The tabloid-sized newspaper was called the Day Book, and at a penny a copy, it aimed for a working-class market, crusading for higher wages, more unions, safer factories, lower streetcar fares, and women's right to vote. It also tackled the important stories ignored by most other dailies, like the labor conflicts that shook Chicago in 1912.

Though the Day Book's financial losses steadily declined over the years, it never became profitable, and publication ended in 1917. Nevertheless, Stoltzfus explains that the Day Book served as an important ally of workers, a keen watchdog on advertisers, and it redefined news by providing an example of a paper that treated its readers first as citizens with rights rather than simply as consumers.

| Contents Acknowledgments Introduction 1. A Time for Dissent and Reform 2. Chain-Builder for the Common People 3. The Secret Plan Takes Shape 4. The Day Book's Debut 5. Critic of the Hometown Press 6. Sandburg and Company 7. Watchdog on State Street 8. Champion of Labor 9. Struggling in the Shadow of War 10. Conclusion 11. Epilogue Appendix A: Chronology Appendix B: Newspapers in Chicago in 1911 Appendix C: Newspaper and Periodical Markets Bibliography Notes |"Fascinating."—Editor and Publisher
"Offering details about Scripps's campaign of secrecy surrounding the experiment, his dislike of department store executives, and his support for labor, this book is an important edition to the literature. . . . Recommended."—Choice
"This book's narrow focus on the Day Book makes an appealing case study of the financing and operating of an American newspaper."—Journal of American History
|Duane C. S. Stoltzfus is a professor of communication at Goshen College and the author of Pacifists in Chains: The Persecution of Hutterites during the Great War.