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Place of Publication
Windsor, Ontario
Description
Title Variation
Dominion
Publication Dates
1867 - 1875
Frequency
Weekly Edition: 1867 - 1875
Daily Edition: 1874 - 1875
Online Holdings
Daily Edition:
1875: Jan. 19 (Vol. 1: no. 24) 4 p.
Keywords
Daily Dominion (Windsor), Dominion (Windsor), Newspapers, Windsor (Ontario), Sandwich (Ontario), Essex County (Ontario)
Disciplines
Canadian History | Public History
Rights
Public Domain
Comments/Notes
The Dominion was a conservative leaning, weekly newspaper founded in 1867, and published in Windsor, initially by John Richmond. John Richmond lived in Colchester. He had previously published the Amherstburg Observer and Agricultural Record (1860-1861). From the 1860s to the 1880s, he served on the Essex County Council as Deputy Reeve and Reeve.
John Richmond sold the newspaper to Solomon White, who later sold it to John L. Murdoch (also Murdock) and Thomas McKee.
John Murdoch (1824-1879) was born in Ayershire, Scotland. There, he kept a bookstore, was a printer, and also a bookbinder. He emigrated to Canada in 1855 and settled in Sandwich. He worked on the Dominion newspaper in Windsor before becoming its owner. (Commemorative Biographical Record, p. 170)
Murdoch and McKee moved the Dominion to Sandwich. It was published in Sandwich from about 1871-1874. It appeared on Saturdays and had a circulation of about 1,300 copies per issue. (American Newspaper Directory 1872, p. 197; Census 1871). Initially, the newspaper was published from a building on lot 5, Bedford Street West (now Sandwich Street). As well as the owners, Murdoch's son, James Murdoch, Robert Timms, and Frederick Neal assisted in the newspaper's production. After a few months, Thomas McKee decided to retire and sold his interest in the paper to his partner, John Murdoch. Murdoch then moved the offices down the street to a building on lot 8. Apparently, a special notice was published in the paper in the autumn which read, "Subscribers wishing to pay their subscription in wood, will please bring it while the roads are good." (Township of Sandwich, p. 209)
In 1874, Murdoch moved the Dominion back to Windsor and with his sons (James C. Murdoch And Brothers) began publishing both a weekly and a daily edition. The Daily Dominion was Windsor's first daily newspaper. It came out every day at 4pm, except on Sundays, and cost $4 per year. The weekly was still published on Saturdays, cost $1.50 per year, and had a circulation of 1,104. (American Newspaper Directory 1875, p. 242)
Around the end of 1875, the Dominion ceased publication and Murdoch sold the printing equipment to Major John Lewis who started a new weekly called the Essex Times.
Although the Dominion was published for about 8 years, only one single 4 page issue appears to have survived. It contains plentiful advertising, local and national news, as well as the provisional election results from the day before (January 18th, 1875). The Dominion takes some credit for the election of the conservative candidate in Essex North, James Colebrooke Patterson. Unfortunately for the conservatives, they lost the election to the liberals.
Updated: Katharine Ball, December 2019
Source of the Digitized Holdings
Museum Windsor
To view online at the Internet Archive: https://archive.org/details/dailydominionwindsorsandwich