PNQ was created through the amalgamation of six privately owned, regionally-based Queensland newspaper companies which represented multiple generations of family control since 1861.
[1] The knock-on effect of an Australian government determination that News Limited, through its purchase of the Herald and Weekly Times which in turn owned a significant proportion of PNQ shares, could not control both the major capital city newspaper, The Courier-Mail, plus a majority of country newspapers, meant that PNQ was bought by the Irish media company Haswell Pty Ltd on 26 July 1988, and then onsold on 2 November 1988 to Australian Provincial News and Media Limited Corporation, a subsidiary of APN News & Media Ltd (APN).
The popularity of its newspapers was reflected in the loyalty of the town-based readership which appreciated the availability of local news reporting, community interest editorials and a strong personal allegiance to a home-grown enterprise.
The Dunns owned or part-owned newspapers in the Queensland country towns of Maryborough, Rockhampton, Toowoomba, Nambour, and Bundaberg.
Dunn and his wife worked amicably as a ‘power couple’ and Jane was noted as an '... astute adviser in business affairs.
[3] In 1911, using the profits generated by The Chronicle, the Dunn family expanded their enterprise by acquiring the controlling interest in the Rockhampton Morning Bulletin.
[4] This resulted, on 1 February 1919, in Andrew Dunn becoming the '...man who initiated the first chain of major provincial newspapers in Queensland.’[4] These families also merged the Widebay and Burnett News and the Maryborough Chronicle.
Herbert Dunn was known for ‘install[ing] dictaphones to take copy by telephone from the Country Press Association’s news service in Brisbane.
[1] In 1910, Manning visited Mackay to purchase equipment for the Port Curtis Dairy Factory, just one of the many organisations in which he held the chairman's position.
[6] After his father became principal shareholder of the Daily Mercury in 1910 he had the opportunity to work in the composing room, and as a reporter, sub-editor, gradually preparing for a managerial role.
Following in his father's footsteps, Alfred Tully Stephenson (1872–1938) [3]) worked in the newspaper industry and was mayor of Ipswich in: 1912, 1914, 1921–1929, and 1933–1938.
The Dunn, Manning and Irwin family dynasties were critical to the operations of PNQ and 'worked together harmoniously and profitably for nigh on a generation'[1] to ensure the success of the newspaper empire.
They were: By following these principles, PNQ was successful for several years in providing an integral public service to regional Queensland by offering a free press that attempted to reflect the community conscience.
[7] As a consequence of adopting both an immediate and far-ranging news focus, provincial newspapers became a vital factor in the development of local life and community.
Accordingly, provincial newspaper publishing provided a broader view of the complexities of the journalistic craft beyond Rudyard Kipling's 'who', 'what', 'why', 'when', 'where' and 'how.
They were then better able to compete with more nationally focused newspapers and other information media (such as television) that could be more cost effectively accessed by consumers.
[5] Profitable Queensland newspaper dynasties were able to support separate enterprises in the one region from the late nineteenth century until the First World War.
However, 'these competitors, as a rule, followed one another in price changes and in stepping up their frequency of publication through biweekly issue to daily status.
Within a decade of the end of the war, many of them had either merged with their rivals or ceased publication with the realisation that advertising revenue had not expanded to keep pace with the sharp increase in production costs.
'[5] Kirkpatrick, the major historian of the regional Queensland newspaper industry observes that 'Competition tended to survive longer in centers far removed from Brisbane.
'[5] This is most evident in the towns listed below: In 1860–61, the Wide Bay and Burnett area quickly developed and prospered leading to the demand for provincial newspapers in the region.
In July 1861, in opposition to Toowoomba's original newspaper, the Darling Downs Gazette, a second journal, The Chronicle, was published providing an opposing political voice on local affairs.
'The Bulletin promised to present full and late details of all events of local interest, with digests of foreign news to be given on the arrival of the mails.’[5] There was no telegraph to Rockhampton.
However, by January 1863, Rockhampton had its second newspaper, the Daily Northern Argus which succeeded a short-lived comic paper, Punch, which originated in July 1862.
As overlanders began to bypass Rockhampton, Bowen became a main trading centre with newspaper demand ultimately resulting in the creation of The Port Denison Times in March 1864.
In February 1868, The Nashville Times was first published as a ‘biweekly to serve the fortune-hunting thousands who had swarmed to the Gympie Creek gold diggings.’[5] As the neighbouring towns of Clermont and Nashville were developed with a mining focus, these two towns were the ‘exception … to the rule of development inspired by pastoral expansion.’[5] The continued expansion of Queensland frontiers led to the establishment of Townsville's first newspaper, The Cleveland Bay Express, in 1866.
The geographic location of Queensland provincial newspapers, with their comparatively limited regional readership, ultimately meant that they were unable to effectively compete in the wider Australian media sphere.
In his analysis of the demise of the PNQ Kirkpatrick discusses some of the strategies 'dying' newspapers had attempted, largely to no longer term avail, in a bid to maintain, if not to increase, their readership.
'[10] Other stresses faced by PNQ included internal disagreements about strategic directions alongside nepotistic and unwise managerial appointments within PNQ which meant that later generation Dunn, Manning and Irwin families 'lack[ed] the knowledge of, and desire to indulge in, the tactics of the competitive media world.
Dr. Rod Kirkpatrick's research on the history of the Queensland provincial press is the primary reference source used in this article.