Rosette Gonzales
The Glendale News-Press was a source for national and global news in
the 1950s, but the domestic content of the inner pages developed
greatly.
Suburbia boomed, and consumer spending grew. Pages were filled
with advertisements for televisions, casual attire and -- most of all
-- automobiles. An additional insert called the Foothill Living
Section commonly came with the paper. This magazine-style insert was
the essential guide to domestic living, covering real estate,
gardens, television shows and homemaking.
Motion-picture reviews and family-entertainment stories appeared
in the paper's regular Features pages. There was a box called "Your
Datebook," listing events around town, much like the Glendale
News-Press Datebook and Around Town lists today.
Churchgoing Americans could also look to the Glendale News-Press
to find the times of local church services, published by
denomination.
The Glendale News-Press seemed to portray an open relationship
with its readers. Publisher Carroll W. Parcher had a regular column
called "In My Opinion," and the Glendale News-Press kept the public
aware of newspaper happenings involving the seasoned journalist.
"Carroll Parcher Elected State Publishers President," read a Feb.
7, 1959, headline, explaining how Parcher was named president of the
California Newspaper Publishers Assn. after serving as its first vice
president.
Beyond community happenings, the decade had just begun when
Americans found themselves engaged in an overseas conflict again.
The Korean War started June 25, 1950, and ended nearly three years
later. But the Cold War raged on. An Oct. 5, 1957, front-page story
detailed the "Soviet-launched artificial moon" named Sputnik, and the
arms race began. The previous day's issue reported the safe escort of
nine "negro" students into Central High School in Little Rock, Ark.
The Glendale News-Press reported on May 18, 1954, of the Supreme
Court's ruling of racial segregation as unconstitutional with a
headline "Some Doubt Change Will Ever Come."
But it finally did come, with integrated classrooms almost three
years later.
