Skip Navigation

Company

New York Times Timeline 1881-1910

1882

September 4

"Electricity comes to The Times. As dusk settles on Park Row, 52 of Edison's bulbs light its building.

1883

April 13

Charles Ransom Miller becomes editor in chief. He will write many of the paper's most famous and controversial editorials until his death in 1922.

View By Year
September 23

The Times drops its daily price to 2 cents on weekdays to compete with The Sun and The World.

1884

October
Grover Cleveland
The Times casts off its reputation as a Republican newspaper when it endorses Grover Cleveland, a Democrat, for president.

1891

August 12

Jones, the co-founder and publisher, dies at 79.

December

To offset the expense of rebuilding its offices at 41 Park Row, the paper's weekday price is raised to 3 cents, causing circulation to drop.

1893

More than a century before The Times's regular use of color in the daily paper, The New York Recorder installs color presses. The World, The Herald and The Journal soon follow.

1896

August 18
Adolph S. Ochs
Adolph S. Ochs, publisher of The Chattanooga Times, acquires controlling ownership of The Times for $75,000, nearly all of it borrowed. He installs himself as publisher. Circulation: 9,000.
September 6

An illustrated Sunday magazine begins, carrying the newspaper's first photographs.

October 10

First issue of The Saturday Review of Books and Art. Within a year it is included in the Sunday paper.

October 25

"All the News That's Fit to Print," coined by Ochs himself after a contest finds no stronger candidate for a slogan, first appears on the editorial page. It moves to Page 1 on February 10, 1897.

December 1

The hyphen is dropped from the nameplate, which now reads "The New York Times."

1897

July 4

The Times publishes 50 halftone photographs of Queen Victoria's Jubilee procession in the magazine. It is a popular and technical triumph.

1898

October 10
NYT Price at 1 cent
In a gamble, Ochs lowers the price of the daily paper to 1 cent. Circulation triples within a year, to 76,000 from 26,000, and advertising revenues soar.

1901

January

The Times starts the new century with two telephones. The reporters themselves own all the typewriters, but most still write their articles in longhand.

Ochs lists products and services unacceptable for ads: word contests, prize puzzles, immoral books, references to diseases of men, female pills, fortune tellers, clairvoyants, palmists, massage, offers of large salaries, offers of something for nothing, guaranteed cures and large guaranteed dividends.

1904

February

Carr Van Anda, having worked for The Sun for 16 years, is hired as managing editor.

April 9

Long Acre Square is no more. With Times Tower under construction, the city changes the name to Times Square.

April 13

The Times receives the first on-the-spot wireless transmission from a naval battle, a report of the destruction of the Russian fleet at the Battle of Port Arthur in the Yellow Sea during the Russian-Japanese war.

1905

January 2

The Times publishes its first issue in Times Tower.

1907

At the instruction of Carr Van Anda, the managing editor, the newspaper sets up a biographical file, or morgue, to index newspaper and magazine clippings. It will reach its millionth name card in the 1940's

.
December 31

For the first time, a lighted ball descends on Times Square to herald the new year.

1909

September
Robert E. Peary
The Times helps to sponsor Robert E. Peary in his race for the North Pole. Peary sends exclusive reports.

1910

May 29
Glen Curtiss
The Times sponsors a daredevil flight from Albany to New York by Glenn Curtiss, resulting in the paper's first Page 1 news photograph.
June 14

First air delivery of The Times, to Philadelphia.

October 16

Walter Wellman sends the first wireless dispatches from a balloon as he tries unsuccessfully to cross the Atlantic.