South Australian advertiser

Front page of first issue of the South Australian advertiser.

The South Australian Advertiser, as it was originally titled, was founded by the Rev. John Henry Barrow. Barrow was a Congregational pastor, member of parliament and ex-Register journalist. Sir Henry Ayers was the first chairman of the board of the newspaper. The earliest issues of the Advertiser were slim four-page productions. The weekly Chronicle was founded at the same time as the Advertiser, as its weekend newspaper. From 1863 the company also published an evening newspaper, the Express.

In 1879 John Langdon Bonython joined the Advertiser as a cadet journalist, and in a short time rose to become editor. In 1893 he became sole proprietor of the newspaper. The South Australian Register was the older rival of the Advertiser and for many years the two newspapers carried on pitched battles of words through their respective columns. The Advertiser was slightly less conservative in its political outlook than the Register.

In 1902 the Advertiser claimed to be the first newspaper in the state to use motor cars in conveying news reports. This was during the murder trial of Mary Schippan at Sedan in the Barossa Valley. In 1933 another first occurred when Bert Hussey flew Melbourne Cup photographs to Adelaide overnight, in time to be printed in the next morning's Advertiser.

The Advertiser was sold to a consortium led by Keith Murdoch of the News in 1929, and from this time the company progressively bought out rival Adelaide newspapers. Murdoch's daughter, Helen Handbury was director of Advertiser Newspapers Ltd. until her death in 2004. At this time the newspaper had a daily circulation of over 200,000 copies.

From 1864 illustrations began to appear in advertisements in the pages of the newspaper, with photographic illustrations being used in the Chronicle from October 1895. Regular photographic supplements appeared in the Chronicle from 1902 to 1944. In 1992 the Advertiser began printing in full colour. Between 1953 and 1955 a Sunday edition, the Sunday advertiser, was published, which eventually amalgamated with the Sunday mail.

With the closure of the News in 1992, and the take over of the Messenger Newspapers group in 1983, the Advertiser has come to hold a monopoly on print news-reporting in South Australia.

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