Importance of Newspapers

September 11, 2020

By Robin Gregg

Newspapers are a media outlet that has been providing readers local news since September 25, 1690, which is when the first colonial newspaper was published in America.

Our role is to provide a community forum and coverage of community events, the publication of timely public notices, highlight accomplishments, information about politics, economy, entertainment, sports, business, industry, trade, and commerce.

Did you know that the Missouri Press Foundation is the only organization that exists primarily to champion the future and quality of Missouri’s newspapers? Members of the Society of 1867 shared the vision of the significant Missouri institutions founded by the Missouri Press Association and newspaper journalists. (https://mopress.com/society-of-1867)

The Monroe-Ralls is dedicated to our communities across the county of Monroe and Ralls. We rely on our readers to inform us of what is happening in their area and it’s our job to dig in further to inform you more of the information which helps you to understand the situation.

I’ve been told that our publication doesn’t include a lot of the same topics as other publications do. There are several reasons why that is. One, our publication like others, rely on advertisers to pay for our printing costs, salaries, and other business costs. Each page of the paper needs to have enough advertisers to pay for each page. If we don’t have the advertiser dollars, we can not keep adding pages per week for content.

This is why we offer online subscriptions to our paper. Our website offers all of that week’s articles and breaking news daily! If you don’t see a recognition or event coverage in the actual newspaper, look online, it’s more than likely on there. Online subscribers are also the first in the know as well as our Facebook page followers. We have also pushed back articles to print in the next edition, look there. If you still don’t see it, reach out to us. More than likely, we either didn’t know about it or are working on the story further before publishing it.

The Monroe-Ralls team is extremely proud of our paper and are in the works of adding more opportunities to offer our followers and readers. If you have any ideas, stories you wish to be covered, events coming up, cancelations, or anything else, reach out to us.

COVID has each of us working from our homes or behind locked doors in the office. We don’t socialize as we use to in order to hear of news to share. We are relying on your communication with us and we are also relying on emails and phone calls. We reach out to as many businesses and schools daily as we can.

As we start to celebrate National Newspaper Week, I’d like to hear from you. Please reach out to me at robingregg@monroecountyappeal.com or send me a message on Facebook.