The Lakeville Journal purchased a new press, moved its office

Focusing on issues, justice

Part 2

After a brief unhappy sale of the paper to Robert Francis in 1969, the Hoskinses bought it back. Then the issue of Dec. 23,1970, announced the sale of The Lakeville Journal to Robert and Mary Lou Estabrook. Bob, who had spent 25 years at The Washington Post, on the editorial page and as a foreign correspondent, became editor and publisher. Mary Lou, who was a homemaker turned photographer, became associate publisher.

The Estabrooks sought to build professional news coverage upon the foundations the Hoskinses had provided, with the addition of Mary Lou’s photographs. The Journal took an early editorial interest in opposing the pumped storage reservoir proposed by Northeast Utilities on and under Canaan Mountain. The proposal was eventually withdrawn.

When 18-year-old Peter Reilly of Falls Village was arrested in 1973 and convicted of manslaughter in the slaying of his mother, Barbara Gibbons, The Journal campaigned hard through news stories and editorials to illuminate questionable state police procedures. Residents of the area who believed in Reilly’s innocence contributed strongly to his defense.

After Reilly was granted a new trial and subsequently all charges against him were withdrawn, The Journal’s role in helping win his freedom and bring changes in state police procedures was recognized in a series of state and national awards. Among them were the national John Peter Zenger Award for Freedom of the Press by the University of Arizona, the Golden Quill award of the International Society of Weekly Newspaper Editors and the Horace Greeley award by the New England Press Association.

Technology in the modern age

Upon retirement of the old newspaper flatbed press in 1968, offset printing of the paper had been contracted to other plants in Litchfield, and then Great Barrington. In 1973 The Journal acquired its first web offset newspaper press, a used model superseded in 1976 by a new four-unit press financed with the help of interested investors in the community. Simultaneously the paper completed its transition from hot type to the first generation of cold type computerized composition.

In 1983 The Journal was able to move to its new building at 33 Bissell St. constructed specifically as a newspaper plant. Among the participants at the open house was Hazel Card, the daughter of Col Card, a lady in her 90s who had come from Springfield, Mass., for the occasion. By that time The Journal had a paid circulation in excess of 6,500.

When the Estabrooks retired at the end of 1986 they sold The Lakeville Journal and The Millerton News to Robert A. Hatch, who had done newspaper and public relations work in California and had worked with the public television program “Sesame Street.â€

Hatch installed a new desktop publishing typesetting system and made other mechanical improvements. Soon after he took over, however, the area plunged into a lingering economic recession that cut severely into advertising and circulation revenues and forced consolidation of some news functions. In addition, he was beset by serious ill health.

After trying to sell The Journal and The News for several years, Hatch reached an agreement in early 1995 with a group of local investors headed by William E. Little Jr. and A. Whitney Ellsworth, whose objective was to keep the papers independent and locally controlled. The sale was concluded in June 1995, with Will Little becoming the chairman of the new limited liability company and Whitney Ellsworth, former publisher of the New York Review of Books, first as publisher, then as managing partner.

Apart from consolidating operations at The Lakeville Journal, the company concentrated on reviving The Millerton News as a distinctly separate publication. Also sensing a need for an independent community newspaper in Winsted, the company launched The Winsted Journal in 1996.

Janet Manko succeeded James Timpano as associate publisher of all three publications. Initially David Parker served as over-all editor, to be succeeded by Ruth Epstein. There were several changes in the editorship in Millerton before Whitney Joseph took over in January 2004. Michael Marciano succeeded June Peterson in June 2000 as editor of The Winsted Journal. Marsden Epworth edits the arts and entertainment section Compass, which appears in all three newspapers.

In February 2005, Janet Manko was appointed editor-in-chief in addition to publisher of all the Lakeville Journal Company publications. Cynthia Hochswender became executive editor of The Lakeville Journal after serving as a reporter at the paper for six years.

In 1998, the company launched its Web site, tcextra.com.