After eight years of publishing in Hollister, Winn sold the newspaper in February 1891 to J. L. Lahiff and moved to San Francisco.
[6] On February 28, 1997, McClatchy sold the Dispatch, along with the Hollister Free Lance, the Morgan Hill Times and the Amador Ledger to Independent Newspapers Ltd. of New Zealand.
[12] The same year, Mainstreet’s controlling shareholder, The Brookside Group of Stamford, CT, put its California newspapers on the market.
[15] In October 2014, Metro’s CEO began to move the paper away from its alignment with petroleum drilling interests and attacks on environmentalists, publicly separating itself from a $1.9 million oil company-funded political campaign in opposition to San Benito County Measure J that heavily featured the Free Lance’s logo and quotes from an opinion piece by its former editorial board.
On July 15, 2016, the Free Lance launched and began distributing San Benito magazine inside each issue.
It won first place in investigative or enterprise reporting, for Connor Ramey, Kollin Kosmicki and Marty Richman's stories on the 2010 San Benito County sheriff's race; first place in breaking news, for coverage of the Pentagon shooting involving a Hollister resident, by Adam Breen, Melissa Flores, Andrew Matheson, Lora Schraft and Kosmicki; first place in the sports photo category for Nick Lovejoy's coverage of San Benito High School sports; second place in the sports photo category, also for Lovejoy's coverage of local sports; second place in online breaking news for coverage of the Pentagon shooting involving a Hollister resident, by Breen, Flores, Matheson, Schraft and Kosmicki.
[19] Under editor Barry Holtzclaw, the Free Lance won two 2017 CNPA first place awards for “Enterprise News Story” and “Editorial Comment”[20] and one second place award for “Editorial Comment” for pieces on the disappearance of funds in a charitable trust managed by school board member Mitchell Dabo.