The closure of The Northern Standard in Co Monaghan will leave a “void” in the community it has served for 186 years, the newspaper’s editor said.
Peter Hughes, who began his apprenticeship as a cub reporter with the regional title in 1980, said it was a sad day but “one we all saw coming”.
On Thursday, the family-owned paper announced on its front page that it is ceasing operations and that the final edition will be printed on December 18th.
Declining readership and a drop in advertising revenue were cited as the reasons for the decision, which was made with “deep and profound regret”.
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The development comes a month after The Down Recorder in Downpatrick printed its final paper after 189 years.
Founded by Arthur Wellington Holmes, the first issue of The Northern Standard – a copy of which resides in the National Museum of London – was published on January 10th, 1839.
It has remained in the ownership of the Smyth family since it was bought by Patrick Smyth in 1971.
The weekly paper has operated from offices in The Diamond in the centre of the Border town for most of its existence.
As a young reporter in his early 20s, Hughes recalled the day when international television crews arrived in Monaghan in the aftermath of Clontibret village being “invaded” by loyalists from Northern Ireland in 1986.
Leading the mob was the then deputy DUP leader and future Stormont First Minister Peter Robinson who appeared in Ballybay District Court after being held for 32 hours in Monaghan Garda station.
“It was like a race to Ballybay,” said Mr Hughes.
“In the furore I ended up sitting beside Mr Robinson at the court hearing. I always remember him with an ‘Ulster Says No’ badge which he wore for the occasion.”
The election of republican hunger striker Kieran Doherty as a TD for Cavan-Monaghan before his death in the H-Blocks of Long Kesh prison in 1981 was among other major news stories covered in the paper.
Last year, a 50th anniversary edition to commemorate the victims of a loyalist bomb atrocity in Monaghan in 1974 was printed.
“Peggy White was among the victims and one of my neighbours in the housing estate where I grew up – a beloved woman,” said Mr Hughes.
At the height of its circulation 40 years ago, the paper was staffed by correspondents in each of the county’s five towns, along with a team of news and sports journalists.
Mr Hughes was appointed editor in 2000.
“We’ve had the privilege for the greater part of our existence as being probably the only newspaper based in Co Monaghan, apart from a period in the second half of the Celtic Tiger era when there was a proliferation of local papers. None lasted more than a few years,” he said.
“I’m very conscious of the void there will be in the community.”
He hopes readers will remember The Northern Standard as a paper that “strived to be a paper of record”.
“We were always a broadsheet newspaper and we will end a broadsheet newspaper – and a community newspaper,” Mr Hughes said.
“Our network of local correspondents were vital in the way we delivered news. It was also very important that local government and courts were served by our journalists.
“I hope that the vacuum created by our departure will be filled by some publication that would meet the need for balanced, objective journalism for which there has never been a greater need.”
