Everything about The Observer totally explained
The Observer is a
British newspaper published on Sundays. Overall slightly to the right of its daily sister paper
The Guardian, it takes a
liberal/
social democratic line on most issues.
History
The first issue, published on
4 December 1791 by W. S. Bourne, was the world's first Sunday newspaper.
Faced with debts of nearly £1,600 Bourne attempted to sell
The Observer to anti-government based groups in London. When this failed Bourne's brother (a wealthy businessman) made an offer to the government, which also refused to buy the paper – but it agreed to subsidise
The Observer in return for influence over its editorial content.
William Innell Clement bought
The Observer in 1814 to add to the number of newspapers he already owned. Clement defied an 1820 court order against publishing details of the trial of the
Cato Street Conspirators who were alleged to have plotted to murder members of the Cabinet. Clement's editor, Lewis Doxat, went big with the story, using wood cut illustrations to promote it.
In 1857 Doxat retired and Joseph Snowe took over the editor's chair. Under Snowe, the paper's circulation declined rapidly, partly as a result of its siding with the North during the
American Civil War between 1861 and 1865.
In 1870 wealthy businessman Julius Beer bought the paper and appointed Edward Dicey as editor, replacing him in 1889 with Henry Duff Traill. When Beer died in 1891, the paper passed to his son Frederick, whose wife Rachel became editor between 1891 and 1904 also edited
The Times, which she'd bought in 1893.
In 1911,
William Waldorf Astor, 1st Viscount Astor (1848-1919) purchased
The Observer from the
Harmsworth family. It remained a
Tory paper, as it had always been, until 1942, with the end of the 34-year editorship of
J. L. Garvin. Garvin had written in a 1919 leading article that the
Treaty of Versailles, which followed the end of
World War I 'left the Germans "no real hope except in revenge"'.
On
27 February 2005 The Observer Blog was launched, making
The Observer the first newspaper to purposely document its own internal decisions, as well as the first newspaper to
podcast. The paper's regular columnists include
Andrew Rawnsley and
Nick Cohen.
Each issue comes with a different free monthly magazine focusing, in rotation, on Sport, Music, Women and Food. These magazines have the titles Observer Sport Monthly, Observer Music Monthly, Observer Woman and Observer Food Monthly. In addition to the rotating magazines there's the Observer Magazine which is present every Sunday.
Content from
The Observer is included in
the Guardian Weekly for an international readership, and articles from the magazines combine with Guardian magazine articles in the
Guardian Monthly magazine.
The Observer is also linked to personal finance and investment magazine
Money Observer, which originally started as a supplement in
The Observer before launching as a stand alone magazine in 1979.
The Observer followed its daily partner
The Guardian and converted to '
Berliner' format on Sunday
8 January 2006,
The Observer was
National Newspaper of the Year at the
British Press Awards 2007
Whitehall Editor Jo Revill had, as Health Editor, been named
Medical Journalist of the Year in 2000 and 2006 by two different organisations, when she was Health Editor.
On October 24th 2007 it was announced that editor Roger Alton was stepping down at the end of the year to be replaced by his deputy, John Mulholland.
Recently there has been a well publicised feud between the Observer and the Guardian, due to the latter taking an editorial line against the 2003 invasion of Iraq, while the Observer has largely been in favour of the invasion, taking the view that spreading liberal democracy is a 'left-liberal' cause.
The Newsroom
The Observer and its sister newspaper
The Guardian operate a visitor centre in London called The Newsroom. It contains their archives, including bound copies of old editions, a photographic library and other items such as diaries, letters and notebooks. This material may be consulted by members of the public. The Newsroom also mounts temporary exhibitions and runs an educational programme for schools.
In November 2007
The Observer and
The Guardian made their archives available over the internet via
DigitalArchive
. The current extent of the archives available are 1900 to 1975 for
The Observer and 1821 to 1975 for
The Guardian. However, these archives are to be expanded in the future.
Editors
Bibliography
David Astor and The Observer by Richard Cockett. Has endpapers which are facsimiles of The Observer, with other black and white photographic plates of personnel linked to The Observer. 294 pages with an index. Further Information
Get more info on 'The Observer'.
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