Everything about The Times totally explained
The Times is a daily national
newspaper published in the
United Kingdom since 1785 when it was known as
The Daily Universal Register.
The Times and its sister paper
The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of
News International. News International is entirely owned by the
News Corporation group, headed by
Rupert Murdoch. Though traditionally a moderately
centre-right newspaper and a supporter of the
Conservatives, it supported the
Labour party in the 2001 and 2005
general elections. In 2005, according to
MORI, the voting intentions of its readership were 40% for the Conservative Party, 29% for the
Liberal Democrats, 26% for Labour.
The Times is the original "Times" newspaper, lending its name to many other papers around the world, such as
The New York Times,
The Times of India, and
The Irish Times. It is the originator of the ubiquitous
Times Roman typeface, originally developed by
Stanley Morison of
The Times in collaboration with the
Monotype Corporation for its legibility in low-tech printing.
The newspaper was printed in
broadsheet format for 200 years, but switched to
compact size in 2004 in an attempt to appeal to younger readers. In May 2006, it announced plans to launch a
United States edition, which began publishing on
June 6 2006.
In November 2006
The Times began printing headlines in its new font,
Times Modern.
Today
The newspaper's cover price in the United Kingdom is 70p on weekdays (a rise of 5p as of
3 September 2007), 30p for students at some university campus shops and £1.40 on Saturday (from
8 September 2007).
The Times' sister paper,
The Sunday Times, is a
broadsheet with a cover price of £2. Although
The Times and
The Sunday Times are both owned by News International, a subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch's Newscorp, they don't share editorial staff and were founded independently. The titles have only shared the same owner since 1967.
Circulation
The certified average
circulation figures for November 2005 show that
The Times sold 692,581 copies per day. This was the highest achieved under the last editor,
Robert Thomson, and ensured that the newspaper remained ahead of
The Daily Telegraph in terms of full rate sales, although
The Daily Telegraph remains the market leader for broadsheets, with a circulation of 905,955 copies, owing to over 300,000 discount subscribers each day.
Tabloid newspapers, such as
The Sun and the
Daily Mail, at present outsell both papers with a circulation of around 3,274,855 and 2,353,807 respectively.
History
The Times was founded by
John Walter in 1785 as
The Daily Universal Register, with Walter in the role of editor. Walter changed the title after 940 editions on
1 January,
1788 to
The Times. In 1803, John Walter handed ownership and editorship to his
son of the same name. John Walter Sr. had already spent sixteen months in
Newgate prison for
libel printed in
The Times, but his pioneering efforts to obtain Continental news, especially from
France, helped build the paper's reputation among policy makers and financiers.
The Times used contributions from significant figures in the fields of politics, science, literature, and the arts to build its reputation. For much of its early life, the profits of
The Times were very large and the competition minimal, so it could pay far better than its rivals for information or writers.
In 1809,
John Stoddart was appointed general editor, replaced in 1817 with
Thomas Barnes. Under Barnes and his successor in 1841,
John Thadeus Delane, the influence of
The Times rose to great heights, especially in politics and amongst the
City of London. Peter Fraser and Edward Sterling were two noted hacks and gained for
The Times the pompous/satirical nickname 'The Thunderer' (from "We thundered out the other day an article on social and political reform.").
The Times was the first newspaper to send
war correspondents to cover particular conflicts.
W. H. Russell, the paper's correspondent with the army in the
Crimean War, was immensely influential with his dispatches back to England.
In other events of the nineteenth century,
The Times opposed the repeal of the
Corn Laws until the number of demonstrations convinced the editorial board otherwise, and only reluctantly supported aid to victims of the
Irish Potato Famine. It enthusiastically supported the
Great Reform Bill of 1832 which reduced corruption and increased the electorate from 400 000 people to 800 000 people (still a small minority of the population). During the
American Civil War,
The Times represented the view of the wealthy classes, favouring the secessionists, but it wasn't a supporter of slavery.
The third
John Walter (the founder's grandson) succeeded his father in 1847. Though the Walters were becoming more conservative, the paper continued as more or less independent. From the 1850s, however,
The Times was beginning to suffer from the rise in competition from the
penny press, notably
The Daily Telegraph and
The Morning Post.
The Times faced financial extinction in 1890 under A. F. Walter, but it was rescued by an energetic editor,
Charles Frederic Moberly Bell. During his tenure (1890-1911),
The Times became associated with selling the
Encyclopædia Britannica using aggressive American marketing methods introduced by
Horace Everett Hooper and his advertising executive, Henry Haxton. However, due to legal fights between the
Britannica's two owners, Hooper and
Walter Montgomery Jackson,
The Times severed its connection in 1908 and was bought by pioneering newspaper magnate,
Alfred Harmsworth, later Lord Northcliffe.
On
May 8,
1920, under the editorship of
Wickham Steed, the
Times in a front-page leader endorsed the
anti-Semitic forgery
The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion as a genuine document, and called Jews the world’s greatest danger. The following year, when
Philip Graves, the
Constantinople (modern
Istanbul,
Turkey) correspondent of the
Times exposed
The Protocols as a forgery, the
Times retracted the leader of the previous year.
In 1922,
John Jacob Astor, a son of the
1st Viscount Astor, bought
The Times from the
Northcliffe estate. The paper gained a measure of notoriety in the 1930s with its advocacy of German
appeasement; then-editor
Geoffrey Dawson was closely allied with those in the government who practised appeasement, most notably
Neville Chamberlain.
Kim Philby, a
Soviet double agent, served as a correspondent for the newspaper in
Spain during the
Spanish Civil War of the late 1930s. Philby was admired for his courage in obtaining high-quality reporting from the front lines of the bloody conflict. He later joined
MI6 during
World War II, was promoted into senior positions after the war ended, then eventually defected to the
Soviet Union in 1963.
In 1967, members of the
Astor family sold the paper to Canadian publishing magnate
Roy Thomson, and on
May 3 1966 it started printing news on the front page for the first time. (Previously, the paper's front page featured small advertisements, usually of interest to the moneyed classes in British society.) The
Thomson Corporation merged it with
The Sunday Times to form
Times Newspapers Limited.
An industrial dispute left the paper shut down for nearly a year (
December 1,
1978–
November 12,
1979).
The
Thomson Corporation management were struggling to run a business under the grip of the print unions at the height of Union powers. Union demands were increasingly difficult to meet. Management were left with no choice but to save both titles by finding a buyer who was in a position to guarantee the survival of both titles, and also one who had the resources and was committed to funding the inevitable migration to technology-based printing.
Several suitors appeared, including
Robert Maxwell,
Tiny Rowland and
Lord Rothermere; however, only one buyer was in a position to fulfil the full
Thomson remit. That buyer was the Australian media baron
Rupert Murdoch.
Both papers had their survival guaranteed and it marked a significant own goal for the radical elements within the Trade Union movement.
Rupert Murdoch
In 1981,
The Times and
The Sunday Times were purchased from Thomson by
Rupert Murdoch's
News International.
Murdoch soon began making his mark on the paper, replacing its editor,
William Rees-Mogg, with
Harold Evans in 1981. One of his most important changes was in the introduction of new technology and efficiency measures. In March–May 1982, following agreement with print unions, the hot-metal Linotype printing process used to print
The Times since the 19th century was phased out and replaced by computer input and photo-composition. This allowed the staff of the print rooms of
The Times and
The Sunday Times to be reduced by half. However, direct input of text by journalists ("single stroke" input) was still not achieved, and this was to remain an interim measure until the
Wapping dispute of 1986, which saw
The Times move from its home at New Printing House Square in Gray's Inn Road (near
Fleet Street) to new offices in
Wapping.
In June 1990,
The Times ceased its policy of using courtesy titles ("Mr", "Mrs", or "Miss" prefixes for living persons) before full names on first reference, but it continues to use them before surnames on subsequent references. The more formal style is now confined to the "Court and Social" page, though "Ms" is now acceptable in that section, as well as before surnames in news sections.
In November 2003, News International began producing the newspaper in both broadsheet and compact sizes. On
13 September 2004, the weekday broadsheet was withdrawn from sale in
Northern Ireland. Since
1 November 2004, the paper has been printed solely in compact format.
The
Conservative Party announced plans to launch
litigation against
The Times over an incident in which the newspaper claimed that Conservative election strategist
Lynton Crosby had admitted that his party wouldn't win the 2005
General Election.
The Times later published a clarification, and the litigation was dropped.
On
6 June 2005,
The Times redesigned its Letters page, dropping the practice of printing correspondents' full postal addresses. According to its
leading article, "From Our Own Correspondents", this was in order to fit more letters onto the page.
In September 2005, the cover price of
The Times was raised to 60
p, the same as
The Daily Telegraph and
The Guardian, and 5p less than
The Independent. It was the first time in twelve years that the cover price of
The Times has matched that of its rivals, a clear indication that News International was no longer prepared to fund the price war it had launched in September 1993 by cutting the price of
The Times from 45p to 30p.
In September 2007, the cover price of
The Times was again raised by 5p to 70p, matching rivals
The Daily Telegraph,
The Guardian and the
The Independent. Its Saturday edition also matches rivals' prices.
In a 2007 meeting with the
House of Lords Select Committee on Communications who were investigating media ownership and the news, Murdoch stated that the law and the independent board prevented him from exercising editorial control.
Image
Long considered the UK's newspaper of record,
The Times was generally seen as a serious publication with high standards of journalism. However, some,
including employees of The Times
, feel it has gone downmarket since being acquired by Murdoch; they cite its coverage of celebrities as evidence, although this increased coverage of and emphasis on celebrity- and sports-related news is rarely given prominence on the front page. It isn't without trenchant critics, however:
Robert Fisk, seven times
British International Journalist of the Year, resigned as foreign correspondent in 1988 over what he saw as political censorship of his article on the shooting down of
Iran Air Flight 655 in July 1988.
Readership profile and image
The British Business Survey 2005 named
The Times as the UK's leading daily newspaper for business people. This independent survey was sponsored by
The Financial Times,
The Guardian,
The Daily Telegraph,
The Economist, and
The Times.
The latest figures from the national readership survey show
The Times to have the highest number of
ABC1 25–44 readers and the largest numbers of readers in London of any of the "quality" papers.
Format and supplements
The main section of
The Times features news in the first half of the paper, with the Comment section midway through the main news, and world news following after this. The business pages begin on the centre spread, and are followed by The Register, containing obituaries, Court & Social and the like. The sport section is at the end of the main paper, with the
Times Crossword puzzle on the inside back cover.
times2
times2 is The Times's main supplement, featuring various lifestyle columns. Its current incarnation began on
5 September 2005, before which it was called
T2 and previously
Times 2. Regular features include an "Image of the Day" and a "Modern Morals" column, where people pose moral dilemmas to columnist
Joe Joseph. The back page is devoted to puzzles and contains
Sudoku puzzles and a
crossword that's simpler and more concise than the main
Times Crossword.
The supplement contains arts and lifestyle features, a regular poetry column, and TV and radio listings and reviews. On Wednesdays,
times2 includes
Crème, the newspaper's supplement for "PAs, secretaries, executive assistants and anyone who works in administrative support." It is read by more secretaries than
The Guardian and
The Evening Standard.
The Game
"The Game" is included in the newspaper on a Monday, and details all the weekend's
association football activity (
Premier League and
Football League Championship,
League One and
League Two.) The Scottish edition of The Game also includes results and analysis from
Scottish Premier League games.
Saturday Times supplements
The Saturday edition of
The Times doesn't carry the
times2 supplement, instead coming with a variety of supplements, on travel, health and wellbeing (called
Body&Soul), and the following:
Books
The only supplement with a quality newspaper devoted to book reviews, features and interviews. It also features a Puzzles section on the back pages, where the
Su Doku puzzles can be found on Saturdays, along with a large crossword and the Listener crossword puzzle. Edited by Erica Wagner
(External Link).
The Times Magazine
The Times Magazine features columns touching on various subjects such as celebrities, fashion and beauty, food and drink, homes and gardens or simply writers' anecdotes. Notable contributors include
Gordon Ramsay, one of Britain's highest profile
chefs, and
Giles Coren, Food And Drink Writer of the Year in 2005.
The Knowledge
The Knowledge is a culture supplement, featuring information and reviews of the coming week's best entertainment.
Its content is usually split up into the sections 'Arts & Entertainment' and 'TV & Radio'. 'Arts & Entertainment' is further subdivided into 'Starts', 'Screen' (which includes film, DVD, Internet and Games), 'Stages' (including Theatre, Dance, Opera and Comedy). 'Sounds' (Music, Clubs and Concerts) and 'Sights' (Museums, Galleries, Events and Kids). 'TV & Radio' consists of reviews and listings for current and upcoming Television and Radio shows.
The Knowledge is published in four different editions depending on region so that the information contained is more relevant to the reader. These are; Scotland and Ireland, North of England, West and Central, East and Southeast and London. It used to be published in smaller
A5 format, but was relaunched in 2005 in an
A4 format in order to more closely resemble the
Saturday Times Magazine.
Money
"Money" is a personal finance supplement with features on investment, mortgages and consumer affairs, among other subjects, plus news and comment. The regular "Money MoT" slot sees experts give a detailed financial makeover to a selected reader. Edited by Andrew Ellson
(External Link).
Events
The Times, along with the
British Film Institute, sponsors the
London Film Festival (or more specifically, The Times
bfi London Film Festival). As of 2005, it's Europe's largest public event for
motion pictures.
The Times also sponsors the
Cheltenham Festival of Literature.
Ownership
Current columnists and journalists
Bibliography
Good Times, Bad Times by Harold Evans. Includes sections of black and white photographic plates, plus a few charts and diagrams in text pages.
Notes and references
Further Information
Get more info on 'The Times'.
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