''The Baytown Sun'', is a newspaper published in
Baytown, Texas
Baytown is a city in the U.S. state of Texas, within Harris County, Texas, Harris and Chambers County, Texas, Chambers counties. Located in the Greater Houston, Houston–The Woodlands–Sugar Land metropolitan statistical area, it lies on the nor ...
, United States. It was first published 1919 as the ''Goose Creek Gasser''.
The paper is owned by
Southern Newspapers Inc., a news-media company based in
Houston, Texas
Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...
.
History
The ''Baytown Sun ''was founded in
Goose Creek, Texas
Baytown is a city in the U.S. state of Texas, within Harris and Chambers counties. Located in the Houston–The Woodlands–Sugar Land metropolitan statistical area, it lies on the northern side of the Galveston Bay complex near the outlets of ...
, as the weekly publication, ''Goose Creek Gasser'', in 1919. By 1928, the paper was operating under the name ''Daily Tribune''. Due to the economic pressures caused by the
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
, in 1931 the ''Daily Tribune'' merged with newspapers in the nearby communities of
Pelly and Baytown. The new newspaper was named the ''Daily Sun'' and was published in the ''Daily Tribune''s hometown of Goose Creek. During the mid-1940s the towns of Baytown, Goose Creek and Pelly voted to
incorporate
Incorporation may refer to:
* Incorporation (business), the creation of a business or corporation
* Incorporation of a place, the creation of municipal corporation such as a city or county
* Incorporation (academic), awarding a degree based on the ...
into one city, with Baytown being the surviving name.
Therefore, in 1949 to better identify with the new community it served, the paper was given its current name, ''Baytown Sun''.
Halloween killer
In December 1985, the Baytown Police Department received five letters from someone identifying themselves as "Madman" and claiming to have been the killer in the Halloween murder of a local 11-year-old girl. Each letter contained a
riddle
A riddle is a :wikt:statement, statement, question, or phrase having a double or veiled meaning, put forth as a puzzle to be solved. Riddles are of two types: ''enigmas'', which are problems generally expressed in metaphorical or Allegory, alleg ...
which when answered, the author stated, would eventually reveal the killer's name. However, if the police answered incorrectly, another child would be killed on Christmas.
In an unusual request, the letters also demanded the answers to the riddles be printed on front page of the Baytown Sun.
When the Baytown police approached then Sun publisher Leon Brown with the request to publish the answers on the front page, he agreed, stating: "Police Chief Wayne Henscey said their publication could very well save a life. I was convinced, as were my editors, that the Sun's cooperation was a life or death situation..."
See also
*
Galveston Bay Area
The Galveston Bay Area, also known as ''Bay Area Houston'' or simply the ''Bay Area'', is a region that surrounds the Galveston Bay estuary of Southeast Texas in the United States, within metropolitan area. Normally the term refers to the mainl ...
*
Wanda Garner Cash
References
External links
The ''Baytown Sun''''Baytown Sun'' mobile versionSouthern Newspapers Inc.
''The Baytown Sun (Baytown, Tex.) 1949-current''
hosted by th
Portal to Texas History
Newspapers published in Greater Houston
Newspapers established in 1919
1919 establishments in Texas
Daily newspapers published in Texas
{{Texas-newspaper-stub