The Baltimore Sun facts for kids

Quick facts for kids
The Baltimore Sun

Light for All
The March 27, 2024 front page of The Baltimore Sun
Type	Daily newspaper
Format	Broadsheet
Owner(s)	David D. Smith and Armstrong Williams
Publisher	Trif Alatzas
Founded	May 17, 1837; 188 years ago (1837-05-17)
Headquarters	200 St. Paul Place
City	Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.
Country	United States
Circulation	43,000 daily 125,000 Sunday (as of 2021[update])
ISSN	1930-8965
OCLC number	244481759

The Baltimore Sun is the biggest daily newspaper in Maryland, a state in the United States. It shares news from local areas, the region, the country, and around the world.

The newspaper started in 1837. It was owned by different companies over the years. In 2021, Alden Global Capital bought it. Then, in January 2024, David D. Smith, who leads Sinclair Inc., bought the paper.

History of The Baltimore Sun

How The Sun Started

The Sun began on May 17, 1837. It was founded by Arunah Shepherdson Abell and two friends, William Moseley Swain and Azariah H. Simmons. They had already started another newspaper in Philadelphia.

Abell had worked as a journalist in other cities like New York and Boston before starting The Sun.

The 20th Century and Beyond

The Abell family owned The Sun until 1910. Then, other families invested in the paper. In the same year, The Evening Sun was created. A famous writer named H.L. Mencken helped lead it.

From 1947 to 1986, The Sun owned Maryland's first television station, WMAR-TV. They sold the station in 1986.

The Sun started opening offices in other countries in 1924. They had offices in places like London, Bonn (Germany), Moscow, Rome, and New Delhi. At one point, they had eight foreign offices. This made them say, "The Sun never sets on the world."

In 1986, the Times-Mirror Company bought the paper. A few years later, in 1997, The Sun bought the Patuxent Publishing Company. This company published 15 weekly papers and magazines in local communities.

In the 1990s and 2000s, The Sun started closing its foreign offices. By 2008, all of them were closed. This happened as the newspaper chain tried to save money.

The 21st Century Challenges

Like many newspapers, The Sun faced challenges in the 2000s. More people started getting news from the internet. This led to fewer readers and less advertising. The newspaper also had to reduce its staff.

In 2000, the Tribune Company bought the Times-Mirror company. In 2014, The Sun became part of Tribune Publishing.

In 2009, The Baltimore Sun had to lay off many staff members. In 2011, they started charging people to read their news online.

Today, The Baltimore Sun is the main newspaper for the Baltimore Sun Media Group. This group also publishes other local newspapers, magazines, and websites. They reach over a million readers in the Baltimore area every week.

In 2014, the Baltimore Sun Media Group bought the City Paper. They also bought other Maryland publications.

In 2021, there was a plan for a nonprofit group to buy The Sun. This deal did not happen. Instead, the person who wanted to buy it, Stewart W. Bainum Jr., started a new nonprofit news outlet called The Baltimore Banner.

In 2022, The Sun's editorial board said they were sorry for past racism. They admitted to publishing ads for selling enslaved people and supporting racial segregation.

In January 2024, David D. Smith bought The Sun. He said he wants to focus more on community news. He also wants to use technology in new ways. Armstrong Williams, a commentator, also has a share in the paper. Williams said the paper's opinion section would stop supporting political candidates. It would also include more conservative ideas, but still have liberal ones.

Different Editions of The Sun

Morning and Evening Papers

From 1910 to 1995, there were two different newspapers: The Sun (published in the morning) and The Evening Sun (published in the afternoon). Each paper had its own reporters and editors.

The Evening Sun was very popular for a long time. But by the 1980s, fewer people were reading afternoon newspapers. People started reading morning papers or watching TV news instead. So, The Evening Sun stopped being published on September 15, 1995.

Daily Newspaper Sections

Now, The Baltimore Sun usually has three sections on weekdays. These are News, Sports, and other sections about business or features. Sometimes, comics and TV listings are in the back of the Sports section.

The paper brought back a business section on Tuesdays and Sundays in 2010. They also added new feature sections like "Home" on Saturdays and "Style" on Thursdays.

Sunday Newspaper Sections

The Sunday Sun used to have a special magazine section with pictures of Maryland. Now, it includes Parade magazine every week. A version of the Sun Magazine was brought back in 2010.

Online News: baltimoresun.com

The Sun launched its website in September 1996. The website gets millions of visitors each month. Sun reporters and editors write many blogs. These blogs cover topics like food, sports, weather, education, and politics.

An iPhone app for The Baltimore Sun was released in 2010.

The b Newspaper

In 2008, the Baltimore Sun Media Group started a daily paper called b. This paper was for younger readers, aged 18 to 35. It was a smaller size, like a tabloid. It had big pictures and focused on entertainment, news, and sports.

The b paper became a weekly paper in 2011. It stopped being published completely in August 2015.

Famous Contributors

The Baltimore Sun has won 16 Pulitzer Prizes. Many famous journalists, reporters, and writers have worked there. One of the most well-known was H.L. Mencken, who worked for the paper for over 40 years.

Other notable people who worked at The Baltimore Sun include:

Newspaper Buildings and Locations

The Baltimore Sun's headquarters from 1950 to 1988, on North Calvert Street

The newspaper's headquarters between 1988 and 2022, at "Sun Park" in Port Covington

The very first issue of The Sun was printed in downtown Baltimore in the 1830s.

In 1851, the newspaper moved to a five-story building. This building was destroyed in the Great Baltimore Fire of 1904.

In 1906, operations moved to Charles and Baltimore streets. The Sun was written, published, and sent out from there for almost 50 years. In 1950, they moved to a bigger, more modern building on Calvert and Centre streets.

In 1988, the company built "Sun Park" in Port Covington. This new building had modern printing and packaging machines. It was also the main office for distributing the newspaper.

On January 30, 2022, The Baltimore Sun was printed at its Sun Park facility for the last time. The printing operations moved to a facility in Wilmington, Delaware.

In December 2022, The Sun announced it would move its offices to 200 St. Paul Place in downtown Baltimore.

News Partnership

In September 2008, The Baltimore Sun started working with TV station WJZ-TV. They share news stories and ideas. WJZ-TV promotes Baltimore Sun stories on its news shows. The Sun promotes WJZ-TV's stories and weather team in its pages.

See also

In Spanish: The Baltimore Sun para niños

• Category:The Baltimore Sun people
• List of newspapers in Maryland
• List of newspapers in the United States by circulation
• Media in Baltimore