The Palmerston Observer was the newspaper of record in Palmerston, Ontario from 1933 to 2000. Recognized as the community’s longest continuously serving newspaper, the Observer had three publishers over the years and was independently operated up until 2000. Publisher K.J. Carleton established the paper with the backing of local businesses in 1933, a few short years after the last newspaper in town – the Spectator – ceased publishing.
After coming to Palmerston from Sudbury to work at the Observer, Arthur Carr purchased the paper in 1938. He was its publisher and editor through to his retirement in 1977, selling the business to former Observer-staffer Laverne Long who continued to run a successful newspaper and commercial print shop until he retired in 2000. The Observer was then bought by Metroland Publishing who merged it with the Harriston Review to create the Minto Express. This coincided with the amalgamation of the municipalities of Palmerston, Harriston, Clifford and Minto Township.
The Minto Express ceased publishing in 2019 and Palmerston hasn’t had a dedicated source of local news since, although the town remains in the coverage areas of the Wellington Advertiser and the Listowel-based Independent Plus.
The occasion of Palmerston’s 150th anniversary and Homecoming seemed the ideal time to bring back the Observer to deliver a special commemorative printed newspaper for the Homecoming weekend in August 2025.
More about the history of newspapers in Palmerston
(from the Wellington County Museum and Archives)
The early newspaper history of Palmerston has been called “meagre and uncertain” and only a handful of early editions have survived: The Progress, started ca.1874; the Telegraph, editor J.T. Lacy; the Reporter, started by Samuel Fleuty; the Vindicator, owned by J.T. Mitchell; the Spectator, started by William Scheiffle, but which ceased in the autumn of 1932.
The most significant newspaper in the history of Palmerston is the Observer. The first issue came from the press Thursday 13 April 1933 and the last 9 June 2000, followed by the Minto Express, which began 14 June 2000. A name usually associated with the Palmerston Observer was editor-publisher William Arthur Carr (1912-1996) – almost always referred to as “Art.” He arrived at the newspaper in April 1934 and was remembered as the “last of the old-time newspapermen in Wellington” and “eccentric and sometimes caustic…an outspoken character, Carr’s newspaper led a number of crusades during his career” there, which ended in 1977, when he retired and sold the paper. His time with the paper saw the introduction of offset lithography, the first for an Ontario newspaper, and the training of dozens of apprentices who went on to play significant roles in newspapers across North America.
Archived editions of the Observer are preserved at the Wellington County Museum and Archives, including numerous copies in the collection that have been digitized and are available to view online.
