The Balonne Beacon was a newspaper published in St George, Shire of Balonne, Queensland, Australia from 1878 to 2020. It was originally called the St. George Standard and Balonne Advertiser.

Balonne Beacon, Saturday 2 January 1909, page 1.

History

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The first issue of the St. George Standard and Balonne Advertiser appeared on 10 July 1878. A fire destroyed the office and printery on 2 September 1905 and it was replaced by the Balonne Beacon, whose first issue was published on 4 October 1905. The Balonne Beacon also absorbed the Maranoa News on 7 July 1955.

William Norman Dendle and Eva Dendle ran the paper from 1936 to 1971; and it was purchased in October 1971 by Max and Rada Pringle, who ran it for twenty-two years until the end of 1993. It was then sold to Rob and Pam Elkington and finally purchased by APN News & Media, the current proprietors, in mid-1997.[1]

Along with a number of other regional Australian newspapers owned by NewsCorp, the newspaper ceased publication in June 2020.[2] On 25 June 2020, the Balonne Beacon published its last printed edition with theheadline “End of our era - 115 years of serving the Balonne shire” on the front page.[3]

Digitisation

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The paper has been digitised as part of the Australian Newspapers Digitisation Program of the National Library of Australia.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Kirkpatrick, Rod (2008). Purposely parochial: 100 years of the Country Press in Queensland. Queensland Country Press Association. ISBN 9780646491943.
  2. ^ "Future is digital: News announces major changes". Gatton Star. 28 May 2020. Archived from the original on 22 December 2020. Retrieved 22 December 2020.
  3. ^ "The presses stop: final newspapers printed in dozens of Australian towns". the Guardian. 25 June 2020. Retrieved 22 December 2020.
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