Katie Peterson | Staff Writer
On April 8, 2021, The Fort Leavenworth Lamp celebrated the 50th anniversary since its first publication. To celebrate, the Frontier Army Museum staff put together an exhibit highlighting “News at Fort Leavenworth” and installed it May 5.
“There haven’t been any exhibits or really much discussion about the history of newspapers on post or just how news was dispersed at Fort Leavenworth,” said Fayelee Overman, FAM museum technician. “I actually discovered some new things I didn’t know, and I know other people haven’t either because I had to dig pretty deep to find things.”
Overman’s research revealed that the post’s first paper, the Fort Leavenworth News, was first actively publishing from 1904 to 1914, according to Library of Congress archives.
Then, during World War I, a newsletter replaced the paper, before it returned in the early 1940s during World War II. At the same time, The Fort Leavenworth Reception Center News and The Shermanian, the official newspaper of Sherman Army Airfield personnel, were also being published.
According to the main informational panel in the exhibit: “(World War II) era newspapers reported on wartime topics and themes of the day. Advertisements for blood drives were a common appearance along with unit gossip, jokes, club bulletins, sports and news about Hollywood actors and actresses. By the end of the war, the papers’ audiences decreased as did funds. No known paper existed on post between 1952 and 1971.”
Enter The Fort Leavenworth Lamp, named by Lt. Col. Robert Simpson, Command and General Staff College instructor, who won a contest to name the post newspaper.
The exhibit features scanned copies of a front page of the Fort Leavenworth News and the Fort Leavenworth Reception Center News; the first issue of The Fort Leavenworth Lamp; a first-place Kansas Press Association award plaque won by The Fort Leavenworth Lamp staff in 2002 for its local coverage of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and the accompanying issue of the paper; and newspaper publishing and photography tools such as a type-size finder used to help determine the size of font used in print, a proportional scale used for the reduction and enlargement of photos, film canisters and spools used to develop film, and a 35 millimeter film camera.
There are also two interactive features including an issue of The Shermanian and an 1839 letter written by John Whaley, Company M, 2nd Artillery, to his grandparents while he was stationed at Fort Leavenworth, which patrons can flip through. The letter represents how news about post and other “gossip” was spread through word of mouth before newspapers were available.
“I hope people are surprised, and I hope people find it interesting that there were different papers on post,” Overman said. “There are so many ways that news was dispersed.
“Now we have our phones, and we can just spread news like crazy,” she said. “Back then, (before the newspapers were established), it was gossip and word of mouth. Hopefully, it’ll get people thinking.”
The Frontier Army Museum is open 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday.
To view the exhibit online with FAM Oncell, visit https://frontierarmymuseum.oncell.com/en/history-of-newspapers-at-fort-leavenworth-291319.html.
