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The online edition of The Tablet you're now reading is just the latest innovation of this newspaper that has served the Diocese of Brooklyn since 1908.
The Tablet was one of the first Catholic newspapers in the United
States, a founder of the Catholic Press Association and the Catholic News
Service, defender of the Church in secular and sometimes anti-Catholic periods
of U.S. history, and clarifier of Catholic tradition, practices, and
beliefs.
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This history is taken from The Tablet: the First Seventy-Five Years by
Alden V. Brown.
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| BEFORE THE BEGINNING |
Before The
Tablet inaugural issue of April 4, 1908, there had been three attempts to
publish a Catholic newspaper in Brooklyn. The Tablet's predecessors were filled
with good intentions, but often under-funded and battered by their
times.
In 1869, Fathers E.A. Fitpatrick and Thomas J. Gardiner founded
the Brooklyn Catholic, which survived only until 1871.
Ten years later
two laymen, Edward Feeney and John Fitzgerald, began a monthly newspaper called
the Catholic Examiner. When they tried to make it a weekly, it too ran into
trouble and finally collapsed in 1887.
In 1890, John McGuiness founded
the Leader, which lasted less than two years.
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| EARLY DAYS |
The
Tablet's own beginnings were a bit rocky. William P. Lawler, who published the
Monitor in Newark, New Jersey, presented a proposal to Brooklyn's second bishop,
Charles E. McDonnell, for a Catholic newspaper in the Diocese. McDonnell was open
to the concept, but unwilling to invest the half-interest of $7500 that Lawler
sought for the project. He did, however, give the paper its name (after the
Tablet of London, which he admired) and appointed the first editor, Father James
Coan.
In his first editorial, Father Coan said The Tablet entered the
ranks of the Catholic press "timidly but confidently." The timidity sprung from
the paper's tenuous financial situation, but the confidence of the paper's small
staff was reflected in the "News from Rome," "News from Everywhere," "Throughout
the Diocese," and features such as "Father Ned and the Youngsters," which filled
the 16-page weekly tabloid.
The price of the newspaper was five cents a
copy or $2.00 for a yearly subscription. The 600,000 Catholics of the Diocese
now had weekly access to news of the Church and the Catholic viewpoint of
affairs of the world.
Behind the scenes of the bold new effort, finances
were precarious. William Lawler, like his forerunners was in increasing
financial difficulty. Bishop McDonnell was anxious for the success of The Tablet
and asked Joseph Timmes, a layman he knew, to intervene. Timmes, a college
professor, purchased a part interest in The Tablet in October 1908. Two months
later he bought the entire stock of Lawler's company for $3600. Over the course
of the next year, Timmes persuaded the Bishop to assume ownership of the
newspaper and on Christmas eve, 1909, The Tablet ownership was officially
transferred to the Diocese.
While Timmes solidified the financial
management of the newspaper, Bishop McDonnell expanded the editorial staff by
assigning Monsignor George W. Mundelein to recruit diocesan priests to form a
corp of contributing editors.
After its first year, The Tablet had a
circulation of 13,000; there were 20,000 copies of the anniversary issue
printed. When enough advertisers were convinced of its success, the paper moved
from tabloid to broadsheet format, allowing more editorial and advertising
space. And soon it had additional support from the fledgling Catholic Press
Association, founded in 1911 with The Tablet as a founding member.
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| THE
TABLET IN CHURCH AND SOCIETY |
In acquainting readers to the history of the
Diocese, The Tablet found a theme: the strength of the Catholic Church,
especially the papacy, in the midst of moral and religious decline. The Tablet
had strong words against liberal Protestantism, viewing the Catholic Church as
"one of the great civilizing factors" of the modern world.
But The Tablet
was also very aware that the "modern world" didn't share its view of the
Catholic faith. In editorials, The Tablet complained about the lack of Catholic
news in the secular press and about anti-Catholic efforts organized by other
newspapers, such as the Menace, which claimed that Italian Catholics were agents
of the pope aiming to undermine American democracy, and the Guardians of
Liberty, a political organization geared toward slamming Catholic candidates for
office.
In its first decade, The Tablet spoke out on the U.S.
government's lack of support for anti-Catholic actions during the Mexican
revolution of 1911, for peace in the days leading up to World War I, and when
that proved to be impossible, for an adequate percentage of Catholic chaplains
to support the many troops who would serve on behalf of the country.
Of special concern
to The Tablet in postwar years was The Red Scare in Russia, but closer to
home, it represented the Catholic Church as "the Church of the poor," and it
had a definite social justice platform. Moral collapse was also on the mind of
The Tablet's editor. There were denunciations of immodest dress, jazz music,
and the theater. The paper also continued warnings against anti-Catholicism,
especially targeting the Ku Klux Klan and the Anti-Saloon League.
By its
second anniversary, The Tablet's editorial direction was firmly in the hands of
Patrick Scanlan, who would be the longest-running editor of the paper, serving
for 50 years. During the Scanlan years, the paper continued to advocate for
morality, printing the Legion of Decency pledge, and taking on causes including the Spanish
Civil War and support for Charles Coughlin (the "radio Priest") and support
of Senator Joseph McCarthy, who saw communism as a significant
threat.
For many of Scanlan's years as editor, communism was a core issue of
debate. For decades, the paper warned against the tactics of the Soviet Union and
declared that "the present totalitarian regime in Soviet Russia is anti-religious
and the greatest menace to the four freedoms in the world today". (from
a front page editorial in October 1944) The Tablet opposed the formation of
the United Nations, in favor of Franco, and was critical of Franklin Roosevelt's
post-war rebuilding plan.
By The Tablet's golden anniversary in 1958,
editor Scanlan declared that the paper would maintain its commitment to the
teaching of the Church and to stability. It would not engage in "fantastic,
secularistic or dreamy innovations in the realm of religion, education, politics
or international events," he wrote in the anniversary issue.
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| RECENT HISTORY |
By the time the changes of the Second Vatican Council swept
through churches in America, The Tablet had also entered a new era. For the
first time in 50 years, The Tablet had a new editor. It was a different Church,
a different Tablet.
In the late 1960s, the paper carried some of
the Church's dissenting voices, and seemingly paid for it. Editor Don Zirkel and
his staff struggled with some of the same issues as newspapers throughout the land -
how to cover independent voices in a Diocesan structure. Circulation also took a
hit in the 1960s. The Long Island Catholic appeared in 1962 and The Tablet lost
20,000 readers to it. At the same time, the home delivery system was running
into difficulties. From a high of 160,000 readers in spring of 1962, the paper
had dropped below 90,000 in late 1968. By the mid-70s, with the Parish Mail
Delivery System, the paper's circulation stabilized to an average
106,000.
The Tablet reached out to new audiences, too, with Spanish
special editions and a regular Spanish insert, and Ms. Tablet, on women's rights
in Church and society. Criticism of the Tablet in the early 1970s led to some
lasting changes based on a first-ever readership survey. The survey found that
while 14 percent of readers found The Tablet "very liberal," the majority saw it
as moderate or middle of the road. Controversial columnists such as Fr. Andrew
Greeley, who had been dropped, were invited back alongside more local voices of
priests of varying views.
Reader preferences also turned The Tablet back
into a tabloid newspaper. A regular monthly Spanish edition, Nuevo Amanecer,
appeared, along with special issues on priests, sisters, brothers, and laity
issues.
Beginning in 1928, The Tablet won awards from its peers in the
Catholic Press Association and the New York Press Association. In 1950, it was
named the "best edited" newspaper by the CPA and won that organization's General
Excellence award in 1972, 1981, and 1982.
The
Tablet occupies an important place in the history of the Catholic press and the
history of the Church in America as a strong voice for American Catholics who
were loyal citizens whose faith called them to stand against the materialism and
unbelief of the age. In the 1960s, under the pressure of Vatican II, the paper
began to reflect the coming of age of American Catholicism, taking a moderately
progressive path to mirror the concern of most Catholics: how to intersect
faithfulness to Catholicism with a sense of sharing in the problems of our
world.
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| PHOTOS |
Volume 1, number 1 of The Tablet, the "Catholic Weekly of the Brooklyn Diocese," was dated April 4, 1908.
Tablet representative
Claude Becker (second from right) was among the delegates to the first Catholic
Press Association in Columbus, Ohio in 1911.
Paulist Father James Gillis was a regular Tablet columnist
from 1929 until his retirement in 1955. The title of his column, Sursum Corda,
was taken from the rite of the Mass, "Lift up your hearts."
The Tablet carried transcripts of the broadcasts of "Radio Priest" Father Charles Coughlin of the Detroit Diocese. Brooklyn priest Edward Lodge Curran appeared on Father Coughlin's program.
Don Zirkel, a young Tablet staff member working his way up from sports coverage to weightier editorial matters, analyzed McCarthy's tactics at the height of the controversy. Zirkel became The Tablet editor in 1968.
Claude Becker, business manager, displays a metal reproduction of the 50th anniversary issue of The Tablet.
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Brooklyn Bishop
McDonnell asked Joseph Times to take part interest in The Tablet. Times
convinced the Bishop to assume full ownership of the paper. Joseph's wife, Anna
Timmes, edited the paper's Home Circle feature under the pen name G.
Marcus.
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Father James Coan was The Tablet's first editor. He would later become the Chancellor of the Diocese.
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Discovered at a Knights of Columbus speaking course, Patrick Scanlan was hired
"temporarily" as managing editor in 1917. He retired from that position in
1968.
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In the early years, The Tablet took on the task of explaining the Catholic view to the world and exposing anti-Catholic views, including those of the Ku Klux Klan.
Home delivery of The Tablet began in 1940. Everett Maxwell,
director of the services, gives two delivery boys some guidelines for their job.
Note the broadsheet size of the paper at that time.
Senator Joseph McCarthy addressed the Catholic press Association
meeting in Rochester, New York, in 1950 and received "tremendous applause."
Tablet editor Patrick Scanlan introduced the senator.
The rights and
dignity of women became a serious concern of the paper early in the 1970s. On
the feast of the Immaculate Conception, the women on the staff published the
first annual women's issue, Ms. Tablet.
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The Tablet staff celebrated its CPA awards in eight categories,
more than any other Catholic weekly in the United States or Canada. Pictured
are (from top) Editor Don Zirkel, Ed Wilkinson, Fathers Robert Kennedy and
Howard Basler, Sister Camille D'Arienzo, John McAlinden, Dorene Reardon, Brother
Charles Felix, Jim Greene, Virginia Owens, Sisters Eve Gillcrist and Betty Lam,
and Diane Moogan.
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The Tablet Publishing Company, Inc. © 2008
Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn
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