family. Vawter Crawford died in April 1935 at the age of 67. Like Otis Patterson, he came from Waitsburg, Wash., to Heppner, and his first journalistic employment in Heppner was as apprentice on the Gazette under Patterson, whom he had known in Waitsburg. He was county clerk for eight years at Heppner. Under his editorship, in 1931, the Gazette-Times won the Sigma Delta Chi trophy as the best weekly newspaper in the state.
The Heppner Herald, which was to continue in competition with the Gazette-Times for ten years, was started in April 1924 by L. K. Harlan, formerly of Condon and Ione. The new paper installed a Model K Linotype, forcing the Gazette-Times also to install a like machine. The Herald, an anti-prohibition paper backed by the liquor interests, was issued as a semi-weekly for about three months under Harlan. With the passing of the saloon, Harlan turned over the paper late in 1915 to Pierce and Fletcher, printers. Several transfers followed until S. A. Pattison took it over and conducted it until 1924, when a disastrous fire sapped his resources and he suspended publication. Returning to Pennsylvania, from which state he had come to Oregon, he died there several years later.
The disastrous flood of 1903 which cost 219 lives and hundreds of thousands of dollars in property loss, putting Heppner in the headlines of newspapers all over the world, gave the Gazette and the Times their greatest journalistic opportunity. At that time Warnock and Michell were running the Gazette, and Hicks the Times. Both papers, issued regularly on Thursdays, got out special editions for several days following the disaster, both covering the event thoroughly with news and features and running name of victims as they were learned.
Since the death of Vawter Crawford, the Gazette-Times has been conducted by his two sons, Spencer and Jasper V. Crawford, manager and editor, respectively, who had been associated with him.
Boardman.—The Boardman Mirror was established by Mark A. Cleveland, veteran publisher, February 11, 1921. After four years Mr. Cleveland sold the paper to the Arlington Bulletin, with which it was consolidated under the Bulletin's name, September 18, 1925. Boardman has had other little papers, but this was the most conspicuous.
Cleveland never worried much about circulation. He used to tell a story of another country newspaper man who worried even less and must have been typical of those who started papers in two-acre towns:
Once when Cleveland visited this editor and helped to get out the paper, he was surprised to find that the circulation was only 80 copies.
"Pretty small circulation," commented Mark. "Why don't you try to increase it?"
