I hope you’ve noticed the improved print quality of your hometown newspaper. The Clinton Journal has been using a new printer since the first of 2024, and the quality of print and photos is much improved.
I’m pretty sure you’ve noticed the shorter page layout we started this month. We think it’s a much more reader-friendly style.
These changes not only improve the Clinton Journal, but they also save us money, which in today’s newspaper industry, is vital.
Newspapers aren’t the instant news of television or social media, but we are the permanent recorders of local history and the people who make that history. We cover community news that most likely wouldn’t get covered if we weren’t here.
Community newspapers like the Clinton Journal, are the only newspapers covering the local government and school district. We’re here to report on the big issues as well as the small ones. We’re the only newspaper covering our high school sports teams—in good times or bad. We’re the only ones printing your grandchild’s photo at a parade or sporting event. We’re the only ones printing your kids and grandkids’ actual letters to Santa Claus every December.
Here at the Clinton Journal, we do all this with a skeleton crew, the norm in the industry today.
Effective February 29, 2024, the Journal staff will make another adjustment and lock the door to our office on East Monroe Street for the final time.
We’ll keep providing DeWitt County with a quality community newspaper, but we’ll no longer have a public office. Instead, we’re going the way of the modern work world and working from home. With technology what it is, we will be able to continue to provide you with a quality weekly newspaper.
Our phone number will remain the same (217-935-3171) and we’ll be able to take your calls during normal business hours. Mail will go to our Post Office box (P.O. 615) as it always has, but unfortunately, you’ll no longer be able to stop in the office to pay your subscription or pick up a copy of your weekly hometown news. Of course, it will continue to be available at a variety of Clinton and Wapella businesses—check out the ad in our paper for all our business partners.
If you are unable to mail or email us and need to drop off a subscription payment, anniversary announcement, or news item, the Clinton Chamber of Commerce at 101 S. Center, Suite 100, has graciously agreed to accept it for us.
While we’re saddened to be closing our doors to the public, we’re not the first newspaper to make this move. Called “ghost” newspaper offices, we’re still a part of the community but no longer offer a storefront.
You’ll continue to see the Journal staff around town covering meetings, events, games, and parades but now we’ll be writing and selling from home, happy we can continue to provide Clinton and DeWitt County with a quality community newspaper.
#supportyourcommunitynewspaper