The paper is owned and operated by Hearst Communications, a multinational corporate media conglomerate with $4 billion in revenues.

In addition to the regular focus on local news, sports and business, The Advocate pays special attention to the workings of Metro-North Railroad, since many in southwestern Connecticut commute by train.

William Henry "Hen" Holly installed a printing press there, but despite some support from the community, he closed the publication after a few months for lack of revenue.

"[3] The newspaper published very little local news, according to Don Russell, an Advocate columnist who wrote about the early history of the paper.

"[T]he columns were filled with sermons, poems and what were called literary 'gems' from various sources, and some domestic and foreign news items taken from newspapers in big cities.

[3] Holly promoted reading in Stamford in various ways, operating his own circulating library out of his office, with books available to borrowers he deemed responsible.

The facade is in Neo-Italian Renaissance style, and its relatively narrow front widens out considerably in the back, where the newspaper's printing press was located.

)[5] In the late 1940s, the 1947 film Boomerang, directed by Elia Kazan was shot almost entirely in Stamford, and partly at the newspaper's offices, then on Atlantic Street.

In 1978, Anthony Dolan, a staff writer at the time, won a Pulitzer Prize for reporting on city corruption.

The building was constructed by Frank Mercede & Sons Inc. under a contract signed by the Advocate's then-publisher Jay Shaw.

[8] The Advocate and its sister paper, the Greenwich Time, were sold to Hearst for US$62.4 million by Tribune Company in a deal that closed November 1, 2007.

[citation needed] In 2018, The Advocate left its offices on Spring Street and returned downtown, setting up operations on the first floor of 1055 Washington Blvd.