In an age when digital news has wiped out many print publications, the New York City tabloid Daily News continues to be among the largest in the nation. It’s a newspaper known for its outrageous headlines and uncompromising investigative journalism. During its heyday in the 1970s, the Daily News grabbed the attention of the entire country with such headlines as “Ford to City: Drop Dead” and “Bobby Kennedy: Shot in the Head.” Today it’s one of the world’s top-selling newspapers and is owned by the newspaper publishing company Tronc (stylized as “Tronc”).
Founded in 1878, the Yale Daily News Historical Archive is the oldest college daily newspaper in the United States. The archive is open to the public and includes over 140 years of YDN reporting. The Yale Daily News website features a web interface that allows users to access digitized versions of printed issues.
The website also features a searchable database that contains the full text of selected articles from all of YDN’s published issues.
Amid the economic turmoil of the late 1980s, the Daily News found itself operating at a loss of more than $1 million per month. Its parent company, the Tribune Company, put it up for sale to numerous potential buyers, including controversial British media mogul Robert Maxwell, who had purchased The Atlantic magazine and the Daily Mirror tabloid in 1981. Maxwell’s proposed purchase was contingent upon the ten newspaper unions ratifying his agreement with the newspaper’s management.
Although the unions ultimately agreed, the 147-day strike cost the Daily News millions of dollars and severely impacted its circulation. The Times suggested that the loss of readership wasn’t solely due to the strike, but that a combination of factors, such as price increases and production problems, were likely at play.
After months of negotiations, the Daily News reopened its doors on March 10, 1991—just over a year after the start of the strike. The paper’s new publisher, Mort Zuckerman, had successfully negotiated contracts with nine of the newspaper’s ten unions and was able to keep the Daily News going.
Today the Daily News has a strong online presence and is available on mobile devices. It offers a wide range of content, from intense city news coverage and celebrity gossip to classified ads and comics. In addition, the Daily News features a number of high-profile blogs and social media channels.
The Daily News has a moderate-to-liberal political bias and is often contrasted with the right-wing New York Post. The newspaper’s editorial stance has also evolved over the years, with the newspaper moving away from its conservative populist roots during the 1940s to the mid-1970s and eventually adopting a more centrist stance.
The Daily News has an AllSides Media Bias Rating of Left, indicating that the publication leans toward liberal, progressive or left-wing thought and policy agendas. This is our most liberal rating. You can find more about the Daily News’s political bias here.
