Remembering and digitizing The Manchester Journal

One of the publishers of The Manchester Journal, Patty Swaney working in the Historical Room of the Manchester District Library to digitize editions of The Manchester Journal.

In the early 1990s, Manchester had two print newspapers: The first was The Manchester Enterprise, a weekly paper with a long tradition of serving the community, dating back to 1867. The second was a newcomer: The Manchester Journal, a monthly publication with feature-length stories and a magazine style (sometimes likened to The Ann Arbor Observer.) And thanks to the efforts of The Manchester Journal publishers Patty Swaney and Janet Shurtliff and the Manchester District Library’s historical collection digitization project, The Manchester Journal will be soon be digitized and available to read for free online.

But they need your help to locate old issues! If you have any issues of The Manchester Journal you would be willing to loan to be digitized, please contact Patty Swaney at 734-645-3722 or pattyswaney@gmail.com.

Shurtliff explained the publishing process they went through: “This was the early days of desktop publishing. Almost no one had a home computer. Few people had ever even used one. PCs were still in the world of DOS , and the ‘Windows’ operating system was just being developed by Microsoft. And yet [we] ambitiously acted on [our] vision to create and publish stories about the Manchester area – its history, current events, interesting people, political intrigue, etc.” In fact, they borrowed and used Apple’s Macintosh Classic, a one-piece model with a built-in, tiny 9” black & white monitor.

For nearly two years, they published monthly editions with 28-32 pages. Shurtliff elaborated, “It was delivered free of charge to every household with a 48158 mailing address. The Manchester Journal provided a lively and important contribution to the community. Its demise was the result of several factors, too complex to sum up here.”

Hopefully we can all look forward to reading those stories in the not-too-distant future! Here are teasers of just a few:

• Here a Plan, There a Plan, Everywhere a Master Plan
• Manchester’s Very Own Computer Gorillas
• Manchester Celebrates 125 years
• The Black Sheep Fire: What’s Next?
• The History of Sharon Mill (and Benson Ford’s visit to town promoting the idea of a heritage trail of Ford Mills)
• A Tour of the Sewage Treatment Plant
• Village Election: We’ve Got a Horse Race!
• Creative & Clever: Our Little Town’s Plethora of Crafters
• A Day in the Life at the High School
• How the pastor of Sharon United Methodist Church found homespun theological truths while in the charcoal pits at the Chicken Broil.
• Saying Good-bye: Mahlon Smith, Elvin Johnson, James Hendley
• All About the History of Bicycling
• Senior Housing/Sharon Twp/Reports & Updates
• Last Minute Christmas Shopping: A Guide to Finding it in Town
• A Man with the Hats: 715 of them!
• Alber Orchard celebrates its 100th anniversary
• Cover artwork by Bill Shurtliff
  And so much more!

For as little as $1 a month, you can keep Manchester-focused news coverage alive.

by Sara Swanson

Sara Swanson is an editor, writer and founder of the Manchester Mirror.