Journal Du Jura

The () is a French-language Swiss newspaper published in Biel/Bienne, Canton of Bern. It was founded in 1871, the successor to two prior papers; in this period it served as an outlet for the Jura Liberals. In 1956, it took over its rival paper, . It is the sister newspaper to the German-language paper ''Bieler Tagblatt''.

History

The paper was founded in 1871 by Franz Wilhelm Gassmann. He was a municipal councillor, parish president, member of the Grand Council of Biel, and the Central President of the Grütli Union. It is published by Gassman AG, owned by the Gassman family. They also publish the German-language newspaper the ''Bieler Tagblatt'', which is its sister paper. In doing this they brought together links between Francophone and German-speaking Switzerland.

It was the successor to the founded in 1863, and then the founded in 1868. Early employees of the paper included Nobel Peace Prize winners Élie Ducommun and Albert Gobat. In this early period the paper functioned as an outlet for the liberal political faction in Jura. Its intended audience was the Francophone population of Biel and the Bernese Jura. It is published six days a week. They share a bilingual newsroom and also share television and radio stations. It is published in Bienne. Its coverage mostly focused on cantonal and local news, but also Switzerland as a whole.

Taking over its only rival newspaper, the Moutier paper (formerly the ), in 1956, it continued to publish a version of this paper named the until 1996. It also merged with a bilingual Bienne paper called ''L'Express''. Following the merger with ''L'Express'', that paper's editor-in-chief Jean-Pierre Maurer became the ''Journal du Jura'''s editor-in-chief, a position he held until his death in 1975. Bernard Eggler was editor-in-chief for nine years, but left in 1994. As of 1995, its editor-in-chief was Mario Sessa. During the Jura separatism struggle the paper voiced opinions of those who wished to stay in the Canton of Bern.

''Journal du Jura'' had a period of good growth from 1985, but like many papers in Switzerland had struggles in the 1990s due to economic and advertising issues. It opened up a new printing centre in 1985, which allowed for four-color printing in the paper. The paper redesigned its format to be more compact in 1993, in order to harmonize its layout with other papers that used the same advertising distribution (including ''L'Express'', ''L'Impartial'', and '' Le Quotidien Jurassien''. It was redesigned again two years later to have instead a more open layout for its text. In the 1990s, it was part of an editorial exchange between several other Swiss regional daily papers, and since February 2007 it has collaborated with ''ArcInfo'' (''L'Express'' and ''L'Impartial)'', from which it takes national and international news.

For its 150th anniversary in 2015, it published several supplements devoted to the history of the Jura region. Its circulation was 13,000 in 1995, and as of 2006, the paper's circulation was 11,980. Gassman AG was bought out by Fredy Bayard, an entrepreneur from Valais, in 2020. He had previously bought out the publishing company that owned the ''Walliser Bote'' two years prior. The paper's archives pre-1996 were made available through the archival service e-newspaperarchives.ch in 2021; no archives of the paper exist for the period of 1871-1875.

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{{Authority control

1871 establishments in Switzerland
Daily newspapers published in Switzerland
French-language newspapers published in Switzerland
Newspapers established in 1871
Mass media in Biel/Bienne