NEWSPAPER DEAL IN SCOTLAND

Greymouth Evening Star, 3 October 1950, Page 8

NEWSPAPER DEAL IN SCOTLAND

[X.Z.P.A. SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT.]

LONDON, October 2.—Cgptain J. I. I. M. Smail, M.C., a son of Mr and Mrs James Smail, of Christchurch, and' the proprietor of the Tweeddale Press, Berwick on Tweed, completed his second Border newspaper deal in 12 months by purchasing the weekly Southern Reporter at Selkirk. Captain Smail last year bought the Kelso Border Mail, one of Scotland’s oldest weeklies and amalgamated it with its chief opposition, the Kelso Chronicle under the name of the Border Chronicle and Mail. This ended a 100 years’ feud between the two Kelso newspapers. Other newspapers in the Tweeddale group are the Berwick Advertiser and the Berwickshire Advertiser. The editor of the Southern Reporter is Mr David Mackie, one of Scotland’s best-known journalists and an author and poet. With the acquisition of the Southern Reporter the group has the net sale of 22,000, in the Border district. The Southern Reporter has been published for 95 years and the press it owns is reported to have printed the proclamation of Bonnie Prince Charlie’s claims to the Throne. Captain Smail, who is 28 years old, is the seventh generation of the family to own the Tweeddale Press. He went overseas as a private in the 2nd New Zealand Expeditionary Force and served in the Western Desert and Italian campaigns, winning the Military Cross at Cassino. He was commissioned Second Lieutenant in the field, and was the first Bth Army man to cross the river Po. ‘ Captain Smail was seconded to the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, and while in Britain he met his cousin, Major H. A. Smail, then proprietor of the Tweeddale Press, and after demobilisation in New Zealand 1 ed him in Berwick.