Janesville’s daily newspaper celebrated its 180th birthday on Thursday, Aug. 14, 2025.
Levi Alden and E.A. Stoddard introduced themselves and shared the vision for their fledgling paper with readers in the first edition of The Gazette published on Thursday, Aug. 14, 1845.
The paper’s history was covered in an Aug. 14 story in The Gazette. According to the story:
The Gazette started out as a weekly publication covering local news and editorially backing Whig Party politics. A subscription was $2 per year. In 1857, Charles Holt bought the Janesville Free Press and combined
it with The Gazette, establishing the Daily Morning Gazette. Janesville has had a daily Gazette ever since.
The Gazette would be owned by a variety of people until Howard Bliss bought it in 1883. The Bliss family would go on to own The Gazette for 136 years, adding a local radio station with the purchase of WCLO radio in 1930 and WJVL Radio in 1947.
The Gazette joined the Associated Press in 1905 and in 1909, moved into a new building at East Milwaukee and Bluff streets. That building would be torn down in 1969 and our current building completed on the same site that year, with an address update: 1 S. Parker Drive.
In 1919, Howard Bliss passed the company on to his son, Harry Bliss. Harry’s sons Sidney and Robert succeeded their father in 1937. Skip Bliss acquired the company as publisher and president in 1992.
GazetteXtra.com, the Gazette’s first news website, was launched in 1997. In 2007, Bliss Communications constructed a new, modern printing and distribution center at 333 S.Wuthering Hills Dr., on Janesville’s east side. The newspaper’s editorial, advertising and business offices, and the radio station offices, remained at 1 S. Parker Dr. in downtown Janesville.
In 2019, Bliss Communications sold The Gazette to Adams Publishing Group and sold the radio stations to Ben Thompson of Big Radio. And in 2020, The Gazette ceased publication of its Saturday and Sunday print editions.
Weekend coverage was reestablished in 2022, however, with the launch of a local Saturday e-edition that has continued to grow in readership. The Gazette’s Monday through Friday print editions can also be viewed as e-editions, and Gazette content can now be accessed on a variety of digital platforms, including on its website, on a phone app and in e-mail newsletters.
