Star Herald’s closure leaves only one newspaper left in Dodge County

As the Star Herald of Dodge Center ended publication last week, it leaves only one newspaper in existence in Dodge County.
Over the years dating as far back as 1857, there have been newspapers in seven communities throughout Dodge County, though they hadn’t all been in operation at the same time.
Almost as soon as settlers arrived, newspapers made their appearance in Dodge County. The first two papers to be published were the Mantorville Express and the Wasioja Gazette, both of which began publication in 1857.
Newspapers representing Claremont, Dodge Center, Hayfield, Kasson, Mantorville, Wasioja and West Concord have all been in existence at one time or another. The last in the family of Dodge County newspapers is the Dodge County Independent based in Kasson.
Dodge Center’s first newspaper, the Dodge Center Press, began publication on Nov. 14, 1874 with John A. Haines and Charles H. Benton as publishers. James A. Miles published the Press until
Feb. 27, 1880, when he sold the newspaper to the Mantorville Express. After the press was sold, Dodge Center was without a newspaper.
The Dodge Center Star was established in 1890 by Edgar Stivers. The two papers merged in 1936 to become the Dodge Center Star-Record.
Larry and Melanie Dobson created Community News Corp. in 2003 when they took over the Hayfield Herald and Dodge Center Star Record. They also took on the Advertiser from Tony and Jackie Pierskalla.
The Dobsons were forced to shut down the Advertiser in 2008 at the height of the recession. In 2009, they combined the Hayfield Herald and Star Record into one newspaper, The Star Herald.
West Concord was platted and a post office established in 1885. The village’s first regularly published newspaper was started by H.P. Ramsborg and G.E. Sloan.
In 1893, they purchased the plant of the Concord Populist, which was a small Populist publication that was published on an irregular basis.
The two men added equipment to the shop, changed the name of the publication to West Concord Enterprise and began to publish weekly on Thursdays in October.
The first years saw a succession of new owners. In May of 1894, Ramsborg and Sloan sold the paper to D.E. Ash and E.A. Berdan.
The paper was sold again on June 12, 1895, when Ulysses B. and B.W. Shaver, publishers from Kasson, took possession of the Enterprise. The Shavers had begun publishing the Dodge County Republican in May of 1867.
The Shavers hired F.W. Hall as editor and in April 1898 A.E. Ball replaced him.
In August 1901, A.E. Pennell, a former Brainerd Dispatch publisher, purchased the Enterprise, giving the paper stability for many years. He purchased a new press and other equipment and enlarged the paper to six-column, eight- page format.
In January of 1916, Pennell sold a half-interest in the paper to his son-in-law, Leslie W. Smith, who had been working there for several years.
On May 20, 1923, the Enterprise plant was destroyed by fire. Pennell and Smith did not miss an issue, however, with the paper printed at the Leader plant in Kenyon until new equipment was installed in West Concord.
By 1925 Pennell was in poor health and in August of that year sold his interest to Smith.
Smith installed an Intertype typesetting machines and others modern equipment.
After World War II, Smith’s son, Donald L. Smith, returned to West Concord from military service and became a partner with his father on Jan. 1, 1946.
The elder Smith died in 1963 and his son took over the publisher’s responsibilities and continued to publish the Enterprise.
Smith said the paper was also a family affair with his mother and grandmother coming into the office every Monday morning. They would divide the phone book in two alphabetically, he said, and they would then proceed to call everyone in the book and ask if they had any news to put in the paper.
By the middle 1970s, however, Don and Loretta Smith were ready to retire and with no one in the family interested in running a newspaper, they sold the Enterprise to Bob Noah, publisher of the Kenyon Leader, who took possession on Nov. 1, 1975. In 1976 Noah had hired Richard Stafford to be the editor of the Enterprise, and on May 1, 1978, he took over the ownership.
Stafford was publisher and editor of the paper for several years before selling it in late 1984 to Lance Wilson, former owner of Wilson’s TV and Appliance. The paper changed hands again in 1989 when Wilson sold it to Bob and Ginny Sendle.
The Sendle’s published the paper for just over a decade until July of 2000 when the Enterprise was sold again, this time to Paula Minks-Amy. During Minks-Amy’s tenure at the paper, Terry Campbell became managing editor and ultimately bought the paper.
Campbell was publisher/ editor of the paper until Nov. 1, 2012, when it was sold to Rick Bussler, the publisher of the Dodge County Independent. Although the Claremont News and the West Concord Enterprise had been owned together for several years, it was not until the spring of 2003 that they were merged and published as the News Enterprise.
Claremont’s first newspaper was a small publication called The Windmill, published by Dr. Horace P. Porter. He also started several other short- lived publications in the area but left for Kansas in 1886.
The Claremont News was first published in 1909, according to Claremont historian Dale Morris. Dana Hinkley became publisher of the paper shortly after and continued to serve in that position until 1963. In 1963, Morris said, the paper was sold to a Mr. Taylor who owned it until the late 1970s. The paper changed hands several times and by 1987 Wilson was listed as publisher of the Claremont and West Concord newspapers.
Back in Kasson, the Dodge County Republican, which was started one-time Enterprise owner Ulysses Shaver, was also going through ownership changes.
Shaver had begun the Republican in 1867 and continued as publisher until 1898, the same year he sold the Enterprise.
The Dodge County Republican had several owners through the first half of the 20th century until it was sold in 1949 to Philip S. Duff, Jr. and Bernard Montgomery who renamed the paper the Dodge County Independent.
The paper was sold again in 1963 to Folmer Carlsen. The Carlsen family, later Folmer’s son, Randy Carlsen, owned the paper until July 1, 2015, when it was sold to Rick Bussler.
The News Enterprise merged into the Dodge County Independent in November 2015.