MaineToday Media

Gannett and Blethen

Masthead Maine's newspaper properties were, for most of the 20th century, the core of Guy Gannett Communications, a local family-owned business not related to the larger Gannett chain. The company was founded in 1921 by its namesake, Guy P. Gannett, and managed by a family trust from 1954 until 1998, when the trust left the media business. It sold its television stations to Sinclair Broadcasting, and the newspapers to The Seattle Times Company, for a price later reported at around $213 million.

Company officials said they sold to the Times Company because of shared values: both companies were fourth-generation family-owned news organizations. "Of all the companies in the newspaper business, The Seattle Times is one most like our company in the sense of independence, of family ownership, and commitment to the community," said Guy Gannett spokesman Tim O'Meara.

The Times Company, then headed by CEO Frank Blethen, set up a subsidiary named Blethen Maine Newspapers to run its Maine operations. Frank Blethen is a descendant of Alden J. Blethen, who was born in Maine in 1845, and later bought The Seattle Times and founded the Times Company in 1896.

Blethen Maine Newspapers operated a subsidiary, Maine Community Publications, which operated The Community Leader/Maine Switch, and The Coastal Journal, a paper which was later merged into The Forecaster network. In the summer of 2006, The Bollard criticized Maine Community Publications for starting a new publication, the Old Port Times, which was apparently "selling editorial coverage to advertisers", and which The Bollard marked as a move that "trade[d] credibility for cash".

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