About the News-Register
We are a tri-weekly community newspaper serving McMinnville and the surrounding Yamhill Valley.
About the News-Register / Oregon Lithoprint
Oregon Lithoprint, Inc. dba News-Register Publishing Co. is a closely held corporation owned by members of the Bladine Family of McMinnville, OR. We are a tri-weekly community newspaper serving McMinnville and the surrounding Yamhill Valley. Our web printing division operates as Oregon Lithoprint, while our newspaper operates as the News-Register. (Click here for Oregon Litho website.)
History
The newspaper traces its family tree through two branches, back to 1866.
First Branch: The Lafayette Courier started in 1866, and by 1872 became the Yamhill County Reporter based in McMinnville. In 1905 the Reporter merged with the McMinnville News (founded 1901) to form the News-Reporter.
Second Branch: The Oregon Register started in 1881 in Lafayette, and the West Side Telephone was founded in 1886 in McMinnville. Those two newspapers merged to form the Telephone-Register, which was purchased in 1928 by Lars Bladine of Iowa. His eldest son, Jack, came first to McMinnville to begin family operation of the newspaper.
Branches Merge: In 1953, Jack and his brother, Phil Bladine, purchased the News-Reporter and merged it with the Telephone-Register, forming the News-Register. They published that newspaper six days a week until 1958, then published twice-weekly. In 1976 the paper became a tri-weekly, later alternated between twice-weekly and tri-weekly before settling into its current schedule of Friday delivery of a printed issue via U.S Postal Service and Monday-Wednesday-Friday production of online "E-editions."
Family Leadership
Lars Bladine was publisher of The Telephone-Register until his death in 1941. Under his leadership, and with Jack Bladine as editor, the paper was named Oregon's best weekly in 1931 and 1935, and was named the nation's best weekly newspaper in 1939.
Jack followed his father as publisher. Phil became editor, and became publisher in 1957 following his brother's death. In 2001, Phil was inducted into the Oregon Newspaper Publisher Association's Hall of Fame.
Phil's son, Jeb Bladine, became editor in 1974 and publisher in 1991. Like his father, uncle and grandfather, he has served as president of ONPA. The News-Register was named Oregon's best community newspaper in its category for 2000, and in most years of the past two decades received the "Sweepstakes Award" from ONPA as the state's most honored non-daily newspaper. Jeb was inducated into the ONPA Hall of Fame in 2024.
Jeb's son, Philip Ossie Bladine, became news editor in 2011 and, in 2014 became a fourth generation of the Bladine family to assume the title as editor. He currently is associate publisher and chief operating officer of the company.
In recent years, the newspaper has won General Excellence honors from ONPA and from both the National Newspaper Association and Inland Newspaper Association.
Members of the company board of directors include Jeb and Michelle Bladine, Chelsey B. Nichol and Brent Nichol of McMinnville, Philip Ossie Bladine and Lacy Bladine of McMinnville, OR, and Guy Everingham of McMinnville, OR.
Community Newspaper Mission
Excerpts from the News-Register's Mission Statement:
"As we discover, report and comment on local people and activities, we maintain a diversity of connection points to the community. We produce a scrapbook of shared experiences, values and norms; we highlight the strengths, assets and resources that exist – or are needed – for local people to built a stronger community; we provide recognition for those efforts.
"In these ways, our content fosters loyalty to the community. Loyalty to community is an important characteristic of our readership base. Surveys show that more News-Register readers feel positive toward their community and their city/school governments, by a 2-to-1 margin over non-readers. Our newspaper plays an important role in those beliefs."
"Our content should provide readers with positive connections to their families, friends and neighbors; to their clubs and organizations; to their environment and their government. That connectivity is essential to the strength of our community, and we are the principal provider of information that helps build community."
"We retain trust and credibility in the community by fulfilling our "watchdog" role. We value our reputation of publishing the news without fear or favor."
"We provide the public with an outlet for community opinions. We "prime the pump" for such opinions through our newspaper editorials and columns, and we are a caretaker of the opinions that are published."
Newspaper Facilities / Printing / Personnel
The newspaper operates from offices at 1315 NE Miller Street in facilities that also house the Oregon Litho printing plant. Company administration, news, sales, circulation and business offices moved from long-time downtown McMinnville facilities in 2022-23.
Oregon Litho is a state/regional provider of commercial offset printing and related services, specializing in printing/binding/distribution of newspapers, magazines, bound books and other printed products. For more information, see link above for Oregon Litho website.
Internet Connections
The News-Register has become an industry leader in the field of Internet journalism, and its website has been honored as best in state and nation in multiple years. The company helped create McMinnville's largest Internet access provider, McMinnville Access Company, now under new ownership as Hunter Communications.
Early involvement with Internet operations continued a tradition of state-of-the-art technological advancements in a company that now traces its history through three different centuries.
