The growth of the market for provincial newspapers was an inseparable part of the development of literacy in the later nineteenth and early twentieth century in Ireland.
In the early 1900s, weekly or bi-weekly papers such as the Tipperary Star supplied their readerships with information and advertising on the commercial, agricultural and cultural affairs of their local districts.
Many papers also sent reporters to cover the regular meetings of the various local elected bodies – county councils, district councils and poor law guardians – set up under the Local Government Act of 1898. With their columns of grey newsprint unrelieved by illustrations or photographs, these long and often detailed reports can be intimidating to approach nowadays.
But a perusal of their contents can…
Source link