Offset in Hartford

Last week Hartford, Conn, had a new daily. It was not just another newspaper. It was the first newspaper in any sizable city to be printed in offset, a type of lithography hitherto tried only by daily newspapers in a couple of small towns in the South (TIME, Feb. 5).

Its founder was Thomas Bice Clemow, 29, onetime New York picture editor of the Associated Press News Photo Service, onetime news editor of Editor & Publisher. From American Type Founders (who are anxious to promote offset) he got a promise of easy terms on presses and equipment. With International Paper Co. he made a deal for a new, hard-surface newsprint. Among the citizens of Hartford he managed to raise $75,000 capital. His stockholders include Francis Goodwin Smith Jr., a member of his staff, whose father runs the Hartford-Empire (glass) Co.; Insurance Agent Thomas Russell; Lawyer Thomas Hewes (onetime special assistant to Secretary of State Cordell Hull).

A 16-page, picture tabloid, Newsdaily has no editorial page. Written by a staff of ten young editors, its features are mainly pictorial take-outs, its cuts liberally scattered on every page. Besides trying a new mechanical process, it is experimenting with a new editorial technique, departmentalized news and a front largely devoted to news summaries.

Hartford (pop. 164,072) already had two papers, the dignified old morning Courant, founded in 1764 (circulation: 41,045), and Frank Gannett's afternoon Times (66,970). But if he can sell 10,000 copies a day at 5-c- apiece (last week's press runs averaged around 8,250), Publisher Clemow thinks he can break even.

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