Illinois newspaper directory. History of the Illinois press association

inoishiNewspaper Dirf.ctoky and HistoryBenjamin F. ShawBenjamin F. Shaw, founder and pioneer editor of the Dixon Telegraph, was bornin Waverly, New York, March 31, 1831. He died in Dixon on September 18, 1909.He was elected to the Hall on November 21, 1930—Election 13. Prior to coming toIllinois in his teens Shaw lived on a farm in Bradford county, Pennsylvania. His firstemployment in the west was as a pony express rider carrying the mail from the Mississippiriver to the interior of Iowa. He learned the work of the printer and country editor inRock Island, Illinois, and then took up residence in Dixon. There he established on May1, 18 J 1, the first paper in the settlement, the Dixon Telegraph and Lee County Herald.Shaw served first as editor and shortly after as editor and publisher. He sold the paperin 18 59 to join the gold rush converging on Pike's Peak, Colorado. In Denver a fewmonths later he returned to the tasks of the press and worked on the first edition of theRocky Mountain News as a printer. He returned to Lee county, Illinois, one year afterhis departure and purchased the Amboy Times. The next ten years he spent as editorof the Amboy paper, local and, in 1868, Washington correspondent for the ChicagoEvening Journal, and local correspondent for the Chicago Tribune. In 1870 he repurchasedthe Dixon Telegraph and from that time until his death, nearly forty years later,the Telegraph was his chief concern. Shaw served with Lincoln on various party committeesat the time of the launching of the Republican party in the State. He reportedthe Lincoln-Douglas debate at Freeport and had many other contacts with the Civil Warpresident.Eugene Francis BaldwinEugene Francis Baldwin, independent and fearless editor of central Illinois for halfa century, was born in Watertown, Connecticut, on December 1, 1840. He died inPeoria on October 19, 1914. He was elected to the Hall on November 21, 1930Election 14. As a child Baldwin was precocious. The family moved to the middlewest in 185S and he became a student in the Milwaukee high school in Wisconsin. In1860, after completing his high school course, he taught school in Clinton county, Illinois,attended Bloomington State Normal for a time and then enlisted in Company B of the12th Indiana Infantry at the beginning of the Civil War. Late in 1863 he was captured atRichmond and thrown into prison camp where his health was affected. He was dischargedas an invalid and returned to resume his studies at Bloomington State Normal school.A few months later he took an appointment at Chillicothe, Illinois, as principal and fromthat post went to a teaching position in Peoria. In 186 5 he became "local" editor of thePeoria Transcript under Enoch Emery, one of the charter members of the Illinois PressAssociation. Baldwin served as a utility man for three years and was then made politicaleditor. A year later he bought the El Paso Journal of Woodford county. He entered thePeoria field again in 18 70 with the Evening Review. Two years later he lost title to thispaper and again took up his country newspaper, the El Paso Journal, after a few monthson the Rock Island Union. In the country field he experimented with local editionsfor different counties and towns as early as 1S72. He published editions for Clinton, Piatt,LaSalle, and Marshall counties in the years following. In 1877 Baldwin renewed hisattack on Peoria and launched the Peoria Evening Star. The paper took hold at onceand within six months had a circulation of 20,000 a day. Baldwin became sole proprietorof the paper in 1902 and continued as editor-publisher until his death in 1914. He wasalso the author of numerous articles and pamphlets and a novel.658