Saturday, November 13, 2004

California paper puts out an 'Extra!'

Talk about a throw back to the 1920s and 30s! A free daily newspaper in Northern California published an extra (as in "Extra! Extra! Read all about it!") minutes after the verdict in the Scott Peterson murder case came in. Extras were common before broadcast journalism emerged, but they're unheard of today. The last one we heard of was in 1963 when President Kennedy was assassinated, and morning papers wanted to compete with evening papers on the story. The extra was printed by the Redwood City Daily News, which is part of the five-paper Palo Alto Daily News group. According to the AP, the Extra was handed out by Daily News employees within 15 minutes of the verdict. Extras were distributed in Redwood City, Palo Alto, Menlo Park, Mountain View, San Mateo and Burlingame. The editor of the group is Brian Bothun and the publishers are Dave Price and Jim Pavelich, longtime innovators in the free daily field.