the southern publishing company
Pictured through the lens of a Sussex Daily News photographer.
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12: 1932: A crowd surrounds the winner of the London Stock Exchange London to Brighton Walk as he enters the finishing line at the Old Steine, Brighton.
The winner wearing a black shirt, has a swastika emblem on his chest. Correspondence found in a Brighton Town Clerk’s file between Brighton Borough Council and Surrey Walking Club (SWC) shows that SWC were using the swastika emblem, formerly a symbol of good fortune, until at least June 1939.
The first newspaper photograph was included in the Southern Publishing newspaper series in 1926. The picture was of a fire at the Court Theatre in New Road, Brighton. Pictured here in Circa 1938 is Denis Wixey Southern Daily News photographer lining up a photograph in Surrenden Crescent, Brighton?
SOUTHERN PUBLISHING - "The War years"
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1935: A considerable increase in profits has been announced. Large extensions to the Robert Street premises have been in progress during the year to eventually take place of the Spring Gardens premises which have been sold.
1936: A considerable decrease in trading profits because sales of newspapers and advertising revenue has plummeted because of the general depression and competition. The cost of production continues to increase. The first phase of the Robert Street extension has been completed during the year and as soon as the possession of seven cottages owned by the company can be obtained the next phase will take place.
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1938: 2nd April: The Brighton & Hove Gazette is acquired by The Southern Publishing Company.
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1939: Newspaper starts to become rationed in the UK and as a result newspapers become smaller.
Journalism - The true sense of the great British Sub is born as every word has to count and the true art of subbing is born!
Women Compositors are employed to replace the staff shortages due to the war.
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1945: 15th August. Japan surrenders and the Second World War is over. The circulation Evening Argus starts to recover after reorganisation and investment.
Compositors would hand pick text from a wooden box and place into a 'printers stick' ready for the next stage of production. Each letter laid in its own place. The expression mind your p's and q's comes from this part of production because p's and q's could easily be mixed when setting a line of text.
Proofing pages was done by hand and corrections set individually and inserted into a page laying in wait, ready to be sent to the next stage of production which was the Stereotype (plate making) department.
Unloading reels of newsprint in Kensington Street, Brighton. It is inconceivable these days to imagine paper being delivered in such a way or the health & safety of the workers.
Process & Stereotype
Departments
The Process Department was responsible for making the images that were published. These typically comprised of a photographic 'etched' metal plate produced from the image via a large camera and then mounted on a piece of wood or metal.
Once developed the photographic plate was washed to clean from chemicals ready for mounting and sent to the Composing Room for inclusion into a page.
The cylinder type Letterpress lead plates that were loaded onto the Rotary Printing Press (right), were made from a paper mache 'flong' impression (see above). This was made from the composed metal page locked inside a metal frame (called a chase) produced by a Newspaper Compositor .
SOUTHERN PUBLISHING - The 'halcyon days'
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​In the early 50s The Southern Publishing reported a substantial increase in profits and in 1954 a new Rotary Press was installed at Robert Street that increased pagination and therefore advertising revenue.
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​By the 1970s, the circulation of the Evening Argus was well over 100,000 copies per day. After all, there was no Commercial Radio or on-line advertising and relatively little competition in Brighton & Hove. These were the halcyon days of newspaper publishing. But it was not always plain sailing with a series of union disputes involving the NGA, NUJ, SOGAT and Nat Sopa.
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It was only four years later when Maggie Thatcher, Rupert Murdoch and Eddie Shah smashed the unions and after some fierce struggles on the Picket Line in the early 80s - The Argus was no longer a ‘Closed Shop’ and union members were replaced by non-union staff. The demise of ‘hot metal’ and the start of ‘Paste Up’ and the use of bromide paper to make up a newspaper page.
SOUTHERN PUBLISHING - "The early years"
1868: The Southern Publishing Company is founded in a small printing office at 19 Lewes Road, when Henry John Infield published the first issue of the Brighton Daily News (Later became the Sussex Daily News which ceased publication in 1956).
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1880: The Evening Argus launched. This was one of the first evening newspapers in the country to be sold for one halfpenny and was published from 130 North Street, where a loft on the roof housed the pigeons that brought in stories from the far corners of the county.
1926: The first photograph was included. The picture was of a fire at the Court Theatre in New Road.
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1926: Southern Publishing acquires Robinson's printing works and adjoining premises at the southern end of Robert Street, eventually enabling all administration departments to be housed in the same building. The paper was however still printed at North Street.
1933: Adverse trading conditions (locally and nationally) mean a decrease in the investment income.
The company was taking on temporary compositors to work on the voters list, one of the only company’s in the area during the depression. Out of work compositors queued for hours in Robert Street in hope of getting work.
Circa 1929: Vans lined up in Kensington Street, Brighton awaiting the first
newspapers off the press.
Being a Newspaper Compositor in the 'hot metal' days was very skilled work and a typical apprenticeship lasting six years and typically organised by the trade unions.
The Composing Room floor was a hot and busy environment. Deadlines every few hours as regional editions of the newspapers were rushed 'off stone'.
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Women Linotype operators saved the day during the war years. Although paginations were tiny due to paper rationing, newspapers played an important part in keeping up the spirits of a local population.
Being a Linotype operator was hot work and very skilled. The keyboard layout was totally different to that of today and the heat from lead ingots being lowered into moulten lead pot would not be considered safe today.
SOUTHERN PUBLISHING - "After the war"
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1946: As predicted expenditure increases and profits are pegged by restrictions on paper supplies and strict limitations of space allowed to be devoted to advertising.
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1948: Revenue, costs and the sales of newspaper continue to increase substantially. The sale of the Argus increased significantly by 11,000. The paper suffers a staff shortage of Lino Operators who are moving to Redhill to earn £12 a week. The Argus is paying £4 a week.
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1949: Wages and salaries continue to go through the roof and current negotiations with the Newspaper Society and the trade unions are resulting in a further increased in costs.
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1951: Costs spiral. For example a tonne of newsprint that costs £10 pre war, now stands at £60.
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1954: A substantial increase in profits due to circulation and advertising revenue. £90,000 set aside for new Rotary Press and which will give a huge increase in paginations.
The cylinder type metal plates moulded from moulten lead were cleaned up with a file prior to being lifted and wrapped round a cylinder of the Rotary Press.
Department