the hopes of Yaquina Bay, then in Benton county, but dominated a lot of the commercial and political thinking of Corvallis at that time. Robert (Bob) Johnson, who came to Corvallis in 1882, and was for his first year in the city associate editor of the Gazette under the Woodcock ownership and foreman of the mechanical department, says it "was closely allied with the life of the newspapers in those days and for a time the promoters owned and controlled the utterances of every newspaper in Benton county."17 When the scheme collapsed, the promoters' influence went with it and the newspapers were freed of their domination.
C. A. Cole, editor of the Gazette, was fired18 "for his re fusal to obey political instructions from the owners of the paper in that he supported the Republican nominee for state senator in stead of the Democrat whom the owners favored." Cole was Parry's successor on the Gazette. "The railroad," Mr. Johnson relates,19 "which had a controlling interest in the Gazette as well as the Leader, put out a subtle suggestion that Cole should not be too active for the Republican candidate for senator, who was less friendly than the Democratic candidate to the railroad. Cole, new in the town (he had conducted the News at Newport), asked me for advice.
"'Well, if you like your job,' I told him, 'you'd better do as you're told. "Cole, however, decided to support the Republican. The day after election he was removed as editor."
Smarting under this treatment20 he told the railroad representative that he wanted to get out an issue and tell the people why he had been fired. The permission was granted, but proofs were to be submitted to Wallis Nash, representing the railroad company. Johnson set up the type for Cole, including a supplement explaining the situation fully from Cole's point of view. Proofs on the supplement were not submitted to the railroad man, and a bit of a political furore was created in the county when the unexpurgated material reached the readers.
As a result the Republicans decided to finance another paper, and the Chronicle was started as an independent Friday weekly in 1886, with Cole and Wallace R. Struble, who later conducted newspapers in eastern Washington, in charge. They failed to stem the tide, however, and the Chronicle soon died.
And here we come to the founding of the Times, which, with the Gazette, has come down to the present. Robert (Bob) Johnson, previously quoted, who later became a Corvallis banker, and was then one of the journalistic independents of the town, bought the Chronicle plant at sheriff's sale and in 1888 launched the Times, carrying right under the title logotype on page one the phrase "Independent, Fearless, and Free." This referred especially to railroad
