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Show Kaysville's history includes handprinted 'Eagle', newspaper By TOM BUSSELBERG KA YSVILLE Kaysville has a long history as a newspaper town, going back to publication of the Kaysville Eagle 95 years ago next Tuesday. It was the first newspaper to be published in north Davis County, initially handprinted in a west room of the Egbert Hotel (now south Main) by William E. Smith, records re-cords from the book "Kaysville: Our Town" indicate. The paper lasted only about a year when Mr. Smith moved to American Fork, continuing the printing business there. Two years later, John V. Young started the Kaysville Post, but it too was short-lived. From 1904-191 1904-191 1 Farmington's Davis County Argus was north county's only newspaper, the book reports. Some 77 years ago John S. White of Farmington moved the Argus to Kaysville and renamed it The Weekly Reflex. It was housed in a building across from the old H.J. Sheffield Store with Benjamin F. Cummings serving as its first editor. Some of the city's early businessmen busi-nessmen demonstrated an active interest in wanting the paper to continue in Kaysville: John R. Bames, John R. Gailey and Henry H. Blood purchased the business in early 1912 when Mr. White decided "to move on." About that time, two men arrived ar-rived in town who would become synonymous with the paper for many years, William Perry Epperson Epper-son and his son, Clyde Ashley. On April 1 of that year Mr. Epperson became editor and his son Clyde was named business manager. The third issue reported on the tragic sinking of the luxury liner Titanic, April 15, 1912. For months, the paper carried human interest stories about the event, "Our Town" records. School news always held a prominent place in the paper until the final issue last Dec. 29. After less than a year under the new management, advertising and circulation revenues were up 200 percent while Mr. Epperson's editorials edi-torials usually concentrated on furthering Davis County and a bettering bet-tering of life in Kaysville. William Epperson died suddenly Dec. 31, 1930. A special Friday edition edi-tion announced his passing and management passed to son Clyde I - ""if - : , f r ' 1 n, it- This building served as the home of the Kaysville Weekly Reflex for many years. It also housed Inland Printing's job printing operations. It was located where Fran Brown Beauty Salon and several other businesses now add to the economic picture on Center and South Main in Kaysville. A. Epperson. Other managers included: in-cluded: Charles V.K. Sax ton, a son-in-law; Albert W. Epperson, a nephew and Lloyd E. Anderson, the first non-family member to hold the position. Mary Bonnemort Bowring is remembered re-membered in "Our Town" as an editor who made the Weekly Reflex Re-flex "brighter." It's noted that her community newspaper credo was: "A community newspaper should be centered around the community. commun-ity. When the interest of the community com-munity is lost the newspaper is lost." She featured a column, "Mary's Meanderings" that covered many of the city's happenings. The column col-umn included wit and humor presenting pre-senting a light-hearted approach to a variety of subjects. She served from 1952-1965. Another part of the Weekly Reflex Re-flex story included the old Inland Publishing Co. that was a major part of the business. Originally called cal-led the Reflex Publishing Co., that name was changed to Inland Printing Print-ing Co. in June of 1916. In 1919, a large new building was erected on the site of the pioneer Egbert Hotel using the west part of the old building. build-ing. Fran Brown Salon of Beauty is now housed at that site. John Stahle Jr. purchased the Reflex effective Jan. 1, 1965 and it was operated under the direction of the Clipper Publishing Co. until its incorporation as part of the Davis County Clipper last month. Publication Publi-cation activities were moved to Bountiful. |
