Happy Birthday Wall Street Journal!

Today is my son's 12th birthday -- Happy Birthday Nicholas! So it is natural that other important milestones on this day interest me. Watching CBS News Sunday Morning today there was a little bit about the anniversary of the first edition of the Wall Street Journal. I always enjoy reading the Wall Street Journal, conservative in its nature, independent in it's editorial content and full of information that is important at the time it is published. As being part of the new media, it is interesting to reflect on another innovator in how people obtain information they need.

When I lived in the Metro New York area and commuted into the city, I made a friend with someone that introduced me to the Wall Street Journal. Initailly, I would pick up the NY Post and a friend of mine would pick up the Wall Street Journal. We would each read our paper and at the end of the train ride, we would swap papers. Most times suggesting the other to read one or two particular articles. After about a month of reading the Journal, I was picking a variety of publications that expanded my views of the world of business. It was after about a year that he mentioned how excited he was the day I picked up something other than the NY Post. The Wall Street Journal became a staple of my reading. It was a habit that I got out of moving to Florida. I shifted to reading news on the Internet, reading more local material.

Today is the anniversary of the first edition of the Wall Street Journal which is an institution in publishing. Published by the Dow Jones & Company in New York. The Wall Street Journal has a long history in publishing financial news of New York, the US and the World. That first edition hit the streets on July 8, 1889 was 4 pages long and it cost 2 cents. Adverting was 20 cents a line. Thanks to Charles Dow, Edward Jones and Charles Bergstresser journalism shifted. They have kept up with the times and started an online version in 1996.

In reviewing the history and how best to describe the Wall Street Journal, it is best described in the Encylopedia Britannica "Although perceived as favouring the interests of businesses, the Journal's opinion and editorial pages reflect a wide range of highly informed business, political, and economic opinion; readers' letters; and reviews of and comments on the arts. The long-established structure of the Journal includes complete tables reporting all financial and stock market activity for the preceding day as well as thorough reports and analyses of current business topics."

Happy Birthday Wall Street Journal -- Thank you for expanding my horizons...