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Whitman Communications started life as the Canaan Reporter, a weekly newspaper and job shop, in June of 1867 and for most of its existence was more in the newspaper business than in the printing business. Today’s owner, Steve Whitman, is the sixth in the line. Whitman, who bought the business in 1967, knew all but the founder.

The Canaan Reporter was established in June, 1867 by Charles O. (Oscar) Barney, a 22 year-old who lived on a farm on the shores of Orange pond. Until he and his parents came to live in Canaan, the following year, the young publisher commuted between his home and East Canaan, the four miles each way usually being negotiated on foot. He was hardly a capitalist, unless good health and a lot of enthusiasm could be rated as tangible assets. A good part of the little plant was a gift from William Allen Wallace of Canaan Street, a noted citizen, an amateur printer and the father of Judge James Burns Wallace.

Charles and his wife Mary, a school teacher, had a son, Edward A. Barney who was born on July 22, 1881 in Canaan. In 1900, at the age of 18, Ned Barney, as he was known all his life, went to Washington DC as the private secretary to Frank D. Currier of Canaan, newly elected to the Congress. In 1909 Ned married Bessie Hutchinson, who in later years became columnist of the Bird and Garden Notes in the weekly paper for a 36 year stretch. When Ned and Bessie returned to Canaan in 1912, Ned joined forces with his father at the Reporter Press, taking on editorial responsibilities for three weekly papers then being produced.

The printing business in those days was later described by Mr. Barney as “an occupation that ran neck-and-neck with country preaching in the poorhouse sweepstakes.”

Edward A. (Ned) Barney, who took over operations from his father in 1912, and ran things until 1946 wrote the following summary in the Enfield Advocate in 1959 of what life in the print shop was like at the turn of the century.

My first recollections of the old Reporter Office picture a large, sunny room with two windows separated by double glass-paned doors. Seated at composing stands, one at each window, were the two Dells, who set up in brevier type, the news and editorial content of the Reporter.

The Reporter Office of that day had not advanced to the dignity of steam power, although within a year or two a donkey-engine, painted bright red, was to actuate the presses through the medium of a maze of shafts and belting. The sturdy right leg of the press feeder, - and when that tired, the left leg – was the driving force of the handfed press and the “Acme” cylinder. The Reporter pressroom personnel at the time comprised Bert Jones, a Lebanon boy with a half-century of shop toil ahead of him, and Gene Davis, a nephew of the first of the Dells mentioned above. Bert had had scant training for his trade, but he made up in unremitting industry whatever he may have lacked in technique, and generally his lot was one of dull and tedious monotony. His for many years, too, was the era of stinted reward for the long hours that constituted the work week. Fifteen cents multiplied by sixty was what Bert had coming to him Saturday nights and it would be grim consolation to reflect on the fact that it was tax-free. More satisfying compensation and even the 40-hour week was to come to Bert in his sunset years.

Ned Barney again picks up the story at a later date when he writes in the Mascoma Week of January 12, 1966 of the business in the early 20’s.

With the passing of the years, the faithful old Acme press began revealing more and more the infirmities of age. Wired or tied together in its less vital parts, it performed its duties despite the growling of stripped gears and the clatter of bearings worn down to the thinness of a pencil, but it grew painfully obvious the Acme was not immortal. Then came the day when the Reporter Office treasury balance could withstand the cost of replacement, and with a new press on the point of delivery, the battered veteran of so many paper days limped through its last run on an April afternoon in 1922.

During the 12 months that followed the installation of the fabulous Cattrell cylinder, a new job press with its own electric motor was put into operation. A larger paper cutter was installed and other improvements were adopted. The plant boasted four job presses besides the cylinder. It was a relatively prosperous year. That is, it was until the fire of June 1923 which wiped out a great deal of downtown Canaan Village and all of the Reporter Office. Seventeen weeks later we were back in business in our new home on Depot Street.

In June of 1946 Ned Barney and the Reporter purchased the ownership of the Enfield Advocate from Mr. Melbourne Wesley Cummings, one of the family owners of the paper. Mr. Cummings, who grew up in Enfield and also started and owned the Addison-Wesley Press of Cambridge, decided he had more than enough to do to build his publishing business that became the textbook empire we know today.

Two weeks later, in what was probably a somewhat related transaction, the Barneys sold the Reporter Press and its newspapers to Ed and Louise Androvette of Newton, NJ. Four years later they sold to the Edward and Jeanne Bennett and they in turn sold to Elmer and Mary Dulmage in 1954.

After 14 years at the helm, the Dulmages sold to the 6th owners, Bill Johnson and Steve Whitman. In 1970, Whitman, who was the operating partner, started another newspaper, the Connecticut Valley Reporter and in 1971 moved the business to Lebanon, NH. When Johnson went on to the Superior Court in 1971, (and later to the NH Supreme Court) he sold his 50% interest to Whitman ,who shortly thereafter in December of 1972, sold the newspapers to Oliver Stalter of Springfield, Vt., publisher of the Vermont Times-Reporter and other papers. Whitman said at the time, “The printing business has continued to grow and we’ve decided to concentrate our efforts in one field.”

With the business now moved to Lebanon and only doing commercial printing, Whitman decided it was time for a name change to move away from the newspaper business and somehow decided on – Whitman Press.

The Whitman Press was then located in a 7,000 sq ft building on Route 4 in Lebanon and the business was getting ready to expand, having recently bought a used Miehle offset press, a new ATF Chief 15 press and a new camera and plate maker. In addition, the IBM Selectric Composing system, which had replaced the original Mergenthaler-Linotype hot-metal typesetters in Canaan, was moved out to be replaced by the Mergenthaler VIP phototype setting machines. These were punched paper tape driven and had CRT terminals for the operators to check their code and characters on. Marie Space led the group effort and was supported by Marge Grace and Ida Merrill among others. They were to tackle some very large projects as we did composition and film work for many Hearst Corporation titles such as Field and Stream, Cosmopolitan, Motor, and Popular Mechanics do-it-yourself Encyclopedia.

In 1980, the press moved to its present location at Ten Water Street in the middle of downtown Lebanon on the Eastern bank of the Mascoma River in what used to be the American Woolen Mill. This 50,000 sq ft building was erected in 1893 and was used by the woolen business until the mid 1950’s when the company closed down. Over the next 25 years the building had many uses but was mainly used by Daniels Transportation Company as a storage warehouse. Whitman moved into the first two floors and once again expanded the business with new press and bindery purchases.

In 1984, as the first Macintosh computers were being introduced, Whitman Press was ready to try them out and purchased four Mac128’s. They had very little power and couldn’t do much, but six months before the company had tried out the Apple LISA computer and saw for the first time what the power of using WYSIWYG capabilities (instead of arcane coding) would do to the layout of the page. That early LISA came with a 5 megabyte hard drive which was also a radical change in capabilities. A 10 megabyte drive was available for $10,000 additional. Such is history.

The rest of the 80’s and the 90’s seemed to be a technological blur as we have moved from computer to computer, faster and faster, and deeper and deeper into the bits, bytes, RIPS and toner and away from the slugs, ems, film and ink. The process continues and along the way we decided that Whitman Press should become Whitman Communications since communications is what our business is all about and has been over the last 136 years. Stay tuned.