www.observer.co.uk GEORGE VITA KENNETH MICHAEL KATHARINE CLIVE JULIAN LYNN ANDREW ORWELL SACKVILLE -WEST TYNAN FRAYN WHITEHORN JAMES BARNES BARBER RAWNSLEY WHERE FINE WRITING HAS ALWAYS COME FIRST Established 1791 January 2006 www.observer.co.uk OUR STORY 1791 The Observer is published for the first time on Sunday 4 December. A brighter Its founder, WS Bourne, states that it would share ‘the spirit of enlightened Freedom, decent Toleration and uni- versal Benevolence’. 1812 Observer journalist Vincent George Dowling has a real scoop when he not only witnesses the Sunday assassination of Prime Minister Spencer Perceval he also seizes the assassin. 1814 William Innell Clement buys The Observer, adding it to his growing stable of newspapers . dawns 1820 Clement defies a court order against coverage of the trial of the Cato Street Conspirators accused of attempting to murder members of the Cabinet. Woodcut illustrations are used to promote the story. next week 1857 Lewis Doxat, Clement's editor, TO RE-SHOOT is succeeded by Joseph Snowe. Editor Roger Alton introduces the vivid new 1861-1865 The Observer sides with the North during the American Observer, full of energy, style and peerless Civil War. Readership declines. writing – and with colour on every page 1870 Julius Beer, a wealthy busi- nessman, buys the paper. Your Observer is changing. From next week we will appear in a new shape, Roger Alton 1880 Frederick Beer inherits The with a fresh design and with colour on became editor of Observer on the death of his father. every page. Britain's oldest weekend The Observer in Frederick's wife, Rachel, buys the newspaper is about to become Britain's 1998, revitalising Sunday Times in 1893 and edits both brightest Sunday read. the title and papers until 1904. It will still contain all your favourite winning the paper writers, as well as the sharpest news several major 1905 The executors of Frederick coverage, the finest analysis, the most awards and Beer sell The Observer to Alfred trenchant comment. And it will still many new Harmsworth (later Lord Northcliffe). provide the best in Sunday sports writ- readers. Circulation is just 5,000 copies. ing, the most incisive business coverage, and the full range of its 1908 James Louis Garvin (pic- award-winning magazines. The paper Food Monthly and Music Monthly – tured) becomes editor and by 1909 will continue to be vivid yet cultured, will be joined by Observer Woman, circulation has increased to 40,000. and to maintain its reputation for spir- which will be as glamorous as it is ited debate, peerless writing, intelligent, as provocative as it is beau- 1911 William Waldorf Astor buys exuberant presentation, imagination, tiful, as brilliantly entertaining as it is The Observer, subsequently giving it to cheek, humour, indignation, style, eru- informative. We'll cover everything his son, Waldorf. dition, provocation and interrogation. from sex and relationships to cosmetic There will be more. Much more. We surgery, from Coleen McCoughlin to 1919 JL Garvin's editorial on the will be introducing new sections, a Condoleeza Rice, from high street chic Treaty of Versailles at the end of the new monthly magazine, new writers to the best skinny jeans for under £20 First World War condemns the and new illustrators to add to the range and we'll do it with style, insight, and Treaty for leaving the Germans ‘no of our coverage. And the paper will be the very best in Observer writing. real hope except in revenge.’ packaged in a radically fresh design Sport will play over 24 colourful which will make it easier and more fun pages and Review will still bring you 1942 On Garvin's departure, David to read, and ensure that the traditional the best Sunday cultural coverage Astor, Waldorf’s son, begins to mod- values of The Observer find expression available, while expanding and acclaimed TV show The Thick of It was And readers also want a newspaper ernise The Observer. in a thoroughly modern form. improving its CD and DVD section. honoured at the recent Comedy that is changing to reflect the transfor- Advertisements are The issue you buy next week will be Escape will continue to give you itchy Awards. mation in their lifestyles and interests. removed from the the size you hold in your hands now: feet with its travel ideas and Business We recognise that our readership is We will continue to give voice to the front page in favour shorter and narrower than our current and Cash will stay ahead of the pack in changing, and that to meet its new strong liberal tradition that The of news and pho- broadsheet, yet larger than a tabloid depth and breadth of coverage of all need we have to evolve, too. Size is Observer has come to represent in its tographs and and with more pages than we have things financial. becoming an increasingly critical fac- long history. But we will extend our the Profile, a now. It is called a Berliner, a format Our brilliant team of writers – from tor in people's decisions about which coverage of areas that reflect this collective opin- now popular among Europe's most Lynn Barber to Andrew Rawnsley, newspaper to read, as the demand for a expanding agenda – human relation- ion of an indi- successful newspapers. Readers of our Barbara Ellen to Nigel Slater, Robert more efficient and accessible shape ships, parenting, new technology, the vidual in the sister paper, the Guardian, will already McCrum to Mariella Frostrup – will be grows. For many the traditional environment, fashion, ageing, food, news, is intro- be familiar with the shape. enhanced with the arrival of new Sunday has gone, replaced by a day of popular culture, the media, new busi- duced to British Our news coverage will remain at columnists such as Armando Iannucci, activity – whether it be shopping, nesses, sport and leisure. And we will journalism. Ivor the heart of the paper, and the Berliner often described as the father of mod- working, playing sports, travelling or do so with the warmth, humanity, and Brown is format allows greater opportunity for ern British comedy, and whose seeing films and visiting museums wit for which The Observer is justifi- appointed editor in-depth analysis as well as powerful or galleries. ably acclaimed. and the paper projection of breaking stories from our So the Berliner offers a perfect We recognise, too, that our reader- begins to move reporting team. Our comment and opportunity for vibrant design com- ship is complex and diverse, in its away from the con- analysis section will move to the centre Observer Woman bined with an easily handled and attitudes as well as its lifestyles. Our servatism of the of the main paper, and will be convenient shape, easy to navigate and audience is critical, argumentative and Garvin era. enhanced by the addition of new fea- packed with useful information. And quizzical. So we will use the paper and tures and commentators. will be glamorous, readers – advertisers too – used to its website to have a continuous dia- And we will be introducing a section everything the internet and modern logue with you the reader, about the called 7 Days, examining the personali- intelligent, TV technology offers, want much issues we deal with and what we ties and issues that have dominated the higher standards of presentation, should be covering. past week through profiles, diaries and which is why our state-of-the-art We hope you enjoy the new observations. provocative and printing presses are designed to pro- Observer; and if you are a newcomer to Our award-winning stable of vide perfect colour throughout the the paper, we hope you will grow to monthly magazines – Sport Monthly, beautiful paper, a first on a Sunday. love it. 2|THEJanuary NEW 2006 OBSERVER | Unravelling the DNA inside Britain’s oldest Sunday paper For 214 years, The Observer has been seeking after truth, taking a bold, controversial stance on anything from the US Civil War to Suez and beyond. Stephen Pritchard opens the archives For a newspaper to have any chance of survival it must strive to reflect the spirit of the age and to capture the imag- ination of its readers. When The Observer first emerged one cold December morning in 1791 it was aim- ing to do just that, proclaiming that it would be ‘Unbiased by Prejudice, Uninfluenced by Party’ and that its ‘whole object was Truth and the dis- semination of every Species of Knowledge that may conduce to the Happiness of Society’. When he wrote those ringing words, the paper’s first owner and editor,WS Bourne, was deliberately establishing the paper’s DNA, the founding princi- ples that have been at its core since the Age of Enlightenment and sustained it through the Industrial Revolution, the Age of Empire and the tumult of the 20th century. But Bourne did more than just set out his paper’s aims: he drew up the blue- print for all future Sunday journalism by J Grant, a reporter in the days of promising that The Observer would William Innell Clement, was moved to GET OUT OR I DO!’ and gave Garvin tographs, and began to nudge the paper report on ‘the fine Arts… Science, the remark that The Observer was now ‘one three weeks to find a buyer. away from Garvin’s conservatism. Tragic and the Comic Muse, the of the safest contemporary papers to be The editor moved swiftly and the In announcing these changes he National Police, fashion and fashionable put in the hands of ladies’. paper was sold for £45,000 to WW echoed the paper’s founding principles, follies’ – topics still liberally covered in Unease at Britain’s imperial behav- Astor, the American multi-millionaire, and added his own: that the paper must the 21st century.