The News & Observer is 120 years old today.Today s N&O descends from that first paper published by Josephus Daniels. By the time he was 21, he owned three papers in Eastern North Carolina. But Daniels yearned to own a paper in the state capital. So he bought the leading Raleigh paper in 1894, at age 32. He assembled investors, bought part of the paper and took control. The future of the state is bright with promise, he wrote.In the early days, a typical N&O had eight pages and cost 5 cents (more than $1 in today s currency).In the late 1800s, newspapers were born and died the way Internet startups do today. Two Raleigh papers the Observer and the News merged in 1880 to create the News and Observer. Before Daniels took over, the paper was known as the News-Observer-Chronicle. We mark today as our birthday because the paper has been continuously operated as The News & Observer since Aug. 12, 1894.In the early 1890s, Raleigh had 15,000 residents; today it has about 435,000. Raleigh and North Carolina have changed. So has The N&O.The print paper is still important. But we also report the news at and , as well as through Facebook and Twitter. You can read us on your desktop, laptop, tablet and smartphone. We publish a magazine-style daily report on our tablet app and a digital replica edition that is identical to the print edition and can be read as early as 4 a.m.Our past is important to us but not as important as our future. We want to deliver the news how you want it. Thanks for reading The N&O.
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