First Newspaper in Laramie, Wyoming

The First Paper

The Laramie Sentinel was started in this city by N. A. Baker, of Cheyenne, proprietor, with J. H. Hayford as editor and business manager. The first number was issued on the first day of May, 1869. It was a small, five column folio paper, printed one page at a time on a half-medium Gordon press.

Prior to that time, in the winter of 1867-68, the Frontier Index, a nomadic little sheet which was following the construction gang across the continent, was printed at Fort Sanders as a weekly. In May, 1868, it was moved into Laramie where it was printed for a while and shortly afterward moved on with the road to Benton, and soon after from there to Bear River, where it was destroyed by a mob, and its editor, Fred K. Freeman, narrowly escaped being lynched. This sheet was never located here permanently, but had been following the construction train from Omaha west. Thus the Laramie Sentinel may justly claim to be the pioneer paper of Laramie city.

Our files of the Sentinel for first year of its existence have been badly scattered or destroyed, and very few of them can be obtained. At the end of the first year of the existence of the paper, May 1st, 1870, it was purchased by Hayford & Gates, the present proprietors, and since that time complete files have been preserved and bound. We are enabled, however, to gather from the remains of the files of the first year many historical events of public interest, but we cannot give as detailed a statement of all the personal events of Laramie, such as births, marriages, deaths, etc., as we would wish, and hence or chronology of that date must be confined mainly to the leading events in the history of our city, while the subsequent narrative will be complete in all those little matters of personal interest to the old pioneers.

Chronological of the County

The first white child born in Laramie was Patrick S. Keane, son of John and Mary Keane, born June 21, 1868.

The first substantial building erected in Laramie, was the small stone block of Dawson Brothers, on South A Street, now owned and occupied by Charles Kuster, and cost at that time about $5,000. It was built in the spring of 1869.

The next erected, during the summer of 1869, was the present Wyoming National bank building, by Colonel J. W. Donnellan, of the firm of H. K. Rogers & Co., and cost about $10,000.

The third substantial building was the fine stone block on Second Street, erected by M. G. Tonn, for a drygoods and clothing house, and costing about $16,000. The erection of these buildings was regarded as of great interest to the city, and were the first events which inspired the people with confidence in the substantial permanency and future growth of our city.

In August, 1869, Captain W. J. McIntyre, clerk for Superintendent Fillmore, was voluntarily tendered and accepted a first-class appointment in the treasury department by Secretary Boutwell. We chronicle this event because it was the first, and, so far as we know, the last appointment ever rendered to a citizen of Wyoming in any department of the government at Washington. The first public school ever opened in Laramie was organized and put in operation, February 15, 1869, by Miss Eliza Stewart, now Mrs. E. S. Boyd.

The first religious services were instituted by Mrs. E. Ivinson, Mrs. C. A. Wright and Miss Jennie Wright, who started a Sabbath school, July 15, 1868.

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Source: Annals of Wyoming, Volume 15, April 1943, Wyoming Historical Department, Cheyenne, Wyoming.