Caldwell Tribune of 1883 located on Market Street A four-page weekly which came out each Saturday night was the issue content of the first local newspaper. The Caldwell Tribune, begun by W.J. Cuddy late in 1883. The old offices of the newspaper were then located at 509 Market Avenue, on what is now Main Street. In the spring of 1886, Cuddy sold the Tribune so he could take up land for a home near Jerusalem, Idaho, northeast of Horseshoe Bend. Cuddy sold the paper to George P. Wheeler, who published his first issue here on Mary 1, 1886. He organized the paper into the Caldwell Tribune Publishing Company with M.B. Gwinn as president, S.M. Coffin as treasurer, and B.A. Cowden as secretary. In his first editorial, Wheeler said that the "aim of the paper is to furnish a readable re-hash of events occurring daily and to educate the East to a proper conception of the manifold glories of and advantages of Idaho in general and Caldwell in particular. "We will endeavor at all times to print nothing but the truth." A similar policy was published by each successive editor. Wheeler added that the Tribune was politically independent, "not published for a party, but for Caldwell's interests." Later in May, the editor published the remark that the paper would not take sides on any neighborhood quarrels, that it "is not our business to do so." Wheeler's last issue Wheeler led a colorful career here for seven months, in which his editorials were always spicy and often humorous. However, his last issue was published Jan 1, 1887, six months after he began. The paper was taken over by A.K. Steunenberg who stated that the Tribune was not responsible for the personal indebtedness of George P. Wheeler. By Jan. 15, the paper was being printed by the Steunenberg brothers, A.K, and Frank, who had then just arrived from Knoxville, Iowa. Wheeler managed to do all right for himself in spite of the unhappy ending in Caldwell. At the end of January 1887, word reached Caldwell that Wheeler was working on the Hailey Inter-Idaho newspaper and a month later he was in Blackfoot managing the Idaho Reporter where he stayed for several years. The first editor of the paper, Cuddy, did not remain a farmer in Jerusalem for long. In April 1889, he began a newspaper in Vale, Ore. A year later he was working on the Oregonian in Portland. The Steunenberg brothers, in May of 1894, sold the newspaper to R.H. Davis after printing the paper for seven years. Paper to remain weekly Davis, in his first editorial, Mary 13, indicated that the paper would remain a weekly. He said that the paper's main interest "is to promote Idaho and boost Caldwell and especially serve to reflect Caldwell for the kind of citizens it has." In January of 1902, C.J. Shorb became a partner in the business, occupying the position of business manager and local editor. He had been connected with the Tribune for 13 years prior to that time. On Aug. 15, 1903, the firm of Davis and Shorb was dissolved and merged into the Tribune Printing and Publishing Company, Ltd., incorporated on Aug. 21. Principle stockholders were R.H. Davis, president; John L. Davis, secretary, and CJ Shorb, treasurer and mechanical manager. The paper continued to be published each week on Saturdays. Editors changed as policy held Over a 20 year period from 1883 to 1904, the Caldwell Tribune changed editors five times, kept more or less the same newspaper policy and jumped off and on from a weekly to a semi-weekly. The paper would increase in page size, column size and number and in number of pages as the news increased and decreased. One of the explanations for a decrease in size was given in the Nov. 21, 1894, issue, as being due to "short days and irregularity of trains. During this time of year it is almost impossible to get adequate news coverage promptly." And the paper turned its attention to more local and state matters, instead of emphasizing national news released. Earlier that spring the paper announced that the new would, from that time on, be fresher and no longer stale. "One line ads are to be inserted if not repeated in the same issue of the paper." Before that time, one line ads, and invariably the same ones, would, for months at a time, fill the locals column.