The death of a newspaper as we know it

Seattle has had two newspapers for more than 100 years. The Seattle Post Intelligencer, also known as the “P-I”, was founded in 1863. The Seattle Times —where I’ve worked for the past three years— was founded in 1891.

The P-I is now on the verge of extinction as a printed newspaper. The parent company, Hearst Corp., announced two months ago that it would stop printing it in 60 days if no buyer was found. The countdown ended this week and they are expected to announce the fate of the publication in a few days. It is very likely to become a web-only operation with just a fraction of the journalists they employ now. The majority of them will lose their jobs.

Here are a few sketches I’ve done over the past couple of days as a tribute:

The building: It has one of the coolest newspaper signs I’ve ever seen: their slogan “It’s in the P-I” rotates around a globe that has an eagle on top with her wings pointing towards the sky. The letters I had drawn on the sketch were on the other side of the globe when I took the photo. Bad timing. It was freezing and I just wanted to get done.

The trucks: Since the Seattle Times handles the circulation of both papers, there are usually some delivery trucks and vans by our building.

I just had to step outside to sketch one of them. One of my colleagues saw me from the window and took this photo while I was drawing it. Click on the left one to see it larger.

The newsracks: Here’s where you buy the paper. These boxes are a staple of the urban landscape. Red for the P-I, blue for The Times. In the U.S. we are used to newsracks, but they’re not common in other parts of the world, where papers are mostly sold on newstands by humans. I like that system better than these boxes. You can actually have a nice chat about the news of the day with the person who sells you the paper.

Newspapers have been part of urban life in cities around the world for centuries. It’s sad to see them go away. On the bright side, even if the printed media as a way to carry daily news dies, I’m pretty sure that good journalism will live on. This blog, if you think about it, is also an example of journalism that hopefully will live on without being printed on paper.

If you are an urban sketcher I’d recommend that you draw the building of your city’s newspaper. And if you don’t already, buying a copy might help them keep covering the news. I know you can read them all for free online now, but, you know, they are not free to produce. The folks at the P-I know that very well.