Years ago, newspaper carriers earned little money for delivering papers that
cost, in many towns, only a penny apiece. So, some newspaper companies published
a poem each year called the "Carriers' Address." The carrier gave one
copy to each customer as a New Year's greeting. The poem ended with a plea that
customers remember their carrier. The 1888 Carriers' Address from the Daily
State Republican (now the Lansing State Journal) said,
We've delivered your paper fresh from the press,
Sparkling with news from East and from West; . . .
News from everywhere, the world around,
Gathered, condensed, and well-boiled down,
And brought to your door at the close of each day
By the carrier, who always gets mighty small pay.
The end of this 1894 Saginaw Courier-Herald New Year's Carriers'
Address told how all the workers earned good wages except the carriers and then
asked, "Please don't forget the carrier."
Many famous people have been newspaper carriers. Some are in the Newspaper
Association of America's Newspaper Carriers Hall of Fame. They include Walt
Disney, Martin Luther King Jr., John Glenn, Isaac Asimov, 1990 Miss America
Debbye Turner and Olympic speed-skating medallist Christine Witty. You can see
other famous newspaper carriers at the NAA web
site.
The photographs
of newspaper carriers from the Archives of Michigan show carriers
for the Grand Rapids (Evening) Press (c 1914) (left) and a carrier for the Lansing
State Republican (c 1920) (above). (Can you find any girls in the group photo?)
