Reade Francis Brower is a media owner known for owning a majority of the newspapers in Maine during his tenure as owner of

MaineToday Media MaineToday Media, Inc. (abbreviated as MTM) was a privately owned news publisher of daily and weekly newspapers in the U.S. state of Maine, based in the state's largest city, Portland. It included the ''Portland Press Herald'', the state's la ...

. His network of owned papers was described by ''The Maine Monitor'' as a "near-

monopoly A monopoly (from Greek language, Greek and ) is a market in which one person or company is the only supplier of a particular good or service. A monopoly is characterized by a lack of economic Competition (economics), competition to produce ...

Personal life

Brower grew up in

Westborough, Massachusetts Westborough is a New England town, town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 21,567 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, in over 7,000 households. Incorporated in 1717, the town is governed under the N ...

, to his adopted parents Carmel and Richard. He attended the

University of Massachusetts Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst) is a public land-grant research university in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States. It is the flagship campus of the University of Massachusetts system and was founded in 1863 as the ...

, and graduated in 1978 with a degree in

marketing Marketing is the act of acquiring, satisfying and retaining customers. It is one of the primary components of Business administration, business management and commerce. Marketing is usually conducted by the seller, typically a retailer or ma ...

. As of 2018, he is married to Martha McSweeney Brower (). They were married in 1985.

Career

Prior to owning newspapers, Brower was an entrepreneur who started several companies, including an auto catalog and direct-mail company that advertised to 600,000 Maine households each week. In 1985, he founded ''The Free Press''. In 2015, Brower bought

from financier S. Donald Sussman. He continued purchasing Maine newspapers; in 2017, he was the owner of 24 papers in Maine, including four of the state's seven

daily newspapers Daily or The Daily may refer to: Journalism * Daily newspaper, newspaper issued on five to seven day of most weeks * ''The Daily'' (podcast), a podcast by ''The New York Times'' * ''The Daily'' (News Corporation), a defunct US-based iPad new ...

. In 2018, he had acquired six of the seven daily papers in the state (the exclusion being the ''

Bangor Daily News The ''Bangor Daily News'' is an American newspaper covering a large portion of central and eastern Maine, published six days per week in Bangor, Maine. The ''Bangor Daily News'' was founded on June 18, 1889; it merged with the ''Bangor Whig an ...

''). On March 30, 2023, he announced he was looking to sell or take on investors to Masthead Maine, the successor to MaineToday. On March 31, ''Bangor Daily News'' reported that he owned five dailies and 25 weeklies, and six specialty publications. He was 66 at the time. On July 10, 2023, ''Bangor Daily News'' reported that Brower had sold the five daily newspapers and 17 weeklies he owned to the National Trust for Local News, a non-profit.

MaineStay Media

He also owns 6 weeklies that were not included in the 2023 sale: ''

The Ellsworth American ''The Ellsworth American'' is a local weekly newspaper covering Hancock County, Maine. Overview ''The Ellsworth American'' is a locally owned and managed weekly newspaper serving Hancock County, Maine. Publication began Oct. 17, 1851,"In the B ...

'' ( Ellsworth), ''The Mount Desert Islander'' (

Bar Harbor Bar Harbor () is a resort town on Mount Desert Island in Hancock County, Maine, United States. As of the 2020 census, its population is 5,089. The town is home to the College of the Atlantic, Jackson Laboratory, and MDI Biological Laboratory. ...

), ''The Courier-Gazette'' ( Rockland), ''The Republican Journal'' (

Belfast Belfast (, , , ; from ) is the capital city and principal port of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan and connected to the open sea through Belfast Lough and the North Channel (Great Britain and Ireland), North Channel ...

), ''The Camden Herald'' ( Camden), and ''The Free Press'' (Camden). Those six papers had united under the company MaineStay Media in 2022. Four of those newspaper (''The Courier-Gazette, The Republican Journal, The Camden Herald'' and ''The Free Press'') were combined in 2024 to form the ''Midcoast Villager.''

Notes

References

External links

MaineStay Media
Living people 1950s births People from Westborough, Massachusetts University of Massachusetts Amherst alumni 21st-century American newspaper people Businesspeople from Maine American newspaper chain owners {{US-business-bio-1950s-stub