March 4, 2009

Register’s history is that of faith in action

By Roxanne King

It has been said that newspapers write the first draft of history. At the Denver Catholic Register, that history is of faith in action.

Born as the Denver Catholic on March 17, 1900—with the cover printed in green ink in honor of St. Patrick’s Day—this month the Denver Catholic Register will turn 109.

Much of the paper’s success and longevity can be traced to the brilliance of one of its early and longtime editors, Msgr. Matthew Smith.

In 1913 Matthew John Wilfred Smith, a 22-year-old lay journalist, took over the then-failing Denver Catholic Register. He increased circulation, purchased modern presses, and founded the Register System of Newspapers, which at its peak in the 1950s produced some 35 diocesan papers with a weekly circulation of 850,000, and the National Catholic Register, which, at its peak, had a circulation of nearly 1 million.

The Dec. 6, 1954 issue of Time magazine recognized Smith as managing “the biggest and most successful chain of religious newspapers in the world.”

Advancements in technology eventually made it possible for dioceses to produce their own papers and the Register System of Newspapers was sold in the 1970s. Many of those papers, however, including the National Catholic Register, are still in publication.

Today, the Denver Catholic Register, with a circulation of 90,000-plus, is the largest subscription weekly in Colorado.

During his 47-year tenure as Register editor, Smith managed to attend St. Thomas Seminary and was ordained a priest in 1923. He led the paper until his death in 1960.

“Right off, when he started, he wanted to make the paper exciting and make it something people would read,” said Michael Woodward, director of the Cardinal Stafford Library at the John Paul II Center in south Denver. “He was out to beat the competition.”

The editorial coverage of which Msgr. Smith was most proud, vigorously exposed and condemned the Ku Klux Klan.

“The biggest role the Register played in the history of Denver and in Colorado was in 1921-26,” said Karyl Klein, archivist for the Denver Archdiocese. “At that time, the Klan ran the state—the governor was a Klan member and various other city and state politicians were in the Klan.

“Msgr. Matthew Smith, nearly every week, wrote editorials and articles denouncing the Klan,” noted Klein. “Probably his most famous editorial was the one about Governor (Clarence) Morley, a Klan member, trying to halt the Church from offering sacramental wine.”

Other religious leaders, including Protestants and Jews, joined the Catholic Church’s legislative fight and Morley’s bill to outlaw sacramental wine, proposed during his inaugural address in 1925, never made it out of committee.

“The Ku Klux Klan and Msgr. Smith’s coverage of it shows the historical importance of the Denver Catholic Register and why, at least in part, it came to national prominence,” asserted Woodward. “Both Bishop (Henry) Tihen and Msgr. Smith made a conscious effort to combat this movement in print. And they succeeded—they changed public opinion. The Klan dissolved pretty quickly.”

By 1926 the Klan’s control of Colorado politics was largely over.

“The Register’s role in fighting the Klan is noted in all the major histories of the city and state,” said Klein, listing works by authors Tom Noel, Fran Pierson and Stephen Leonard.

In addition to speaking out about injustice, the Register wrote about the philanthropic works of Denver pioneers, including flour miller J.K. Mullen, the “unsinkable” Molly Brown of Titanic fame, and Helen Bonfils, daughter of Denver Post founder Frederick G. Bonfils.

The Register has documented the history of the Church in Colorado, highlighting the work of priests such as the famed Msgr. Joseph J. Bosetti, who helped bring opera to Denver and founded what is today St. Malo Retreat Center as a summer camp for altar boys. Stories have told of the good works of the laywoman Julia Greeley, a former slave who converted to Catholicism and became renowned throughout Denver for her sanctity and pious works of charity, and those of the thousands of religious sisters who established schools, hospitals and orphanages, including Mother Cabrini, patron of immigrants, whose summer haven for orphans is now a shrine dedicated to the saint.

“The history of the work of religious sisters has not been fully told in this part of the country,” said Woodward. “If someone does, the Register will be a primary source, as it was for Dan Dervin’s book on Msgr. Bosetti (‘Father Bosetti in America’).”

Like other newspapers, the Register covered the local impact of the threat of communism, the Great Depression, the World Wars and the Civil Rights movement, and significant moments in Denver’s history such as the visit of now Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta in the 1980s and Pope John Paul II’s World Youth Day visit in 1993.
In addition to historians and authors, those doing genealogical research also turn to the Register’s archives, Klein said, which are now available online for nearly all 109 years of issues and offer a wealth of information.

“When Denver was smaller, the Register was very much a community newspaper and all the parishes had contributors,” Klein said. “Announcements were run when someone was born or got married or died. The Register printed Communion classes—anything that was going on with the Catholic faithful was printed.”

Noting that the Rocky Mountain News was ending its nearly 150-year history in Denver with its Feb. 27 issue, a victim of the troubled economic climate and the changing media landscape, Woodward said the history recorded in the newspaper’s pages will live on.

“It’s sad that we’re meeting to discuss the role of the Register in local history on the day that’s the last for the Rocky Mountain News—the oldest newspaper in Colorado,” he said. “But with online archives, the Rocky Mountain News continues—every day historians are going through that paper. In a sense, it’s still alive even though it’s not going to be published.”

While the loss of the Rocky is a tremendous one for the city and state, the Denver Catholic Register continues its unique mission of informing, evangelizing and catechizing the faithful in northern Colorado.

Despite the emergence of new media, particularly the Internet, the Register as the official newspaper for the Denver Archdiocese remains the flagship tool for the Denver bishops to communicate with the faithful.

“As the Denver Catholic Register looks toward turning 109 this month, it celebrates the fact that its history is inextricably linked with that of Denver and that it continues to share the good news of God’s people today,” said Jeanette DeMelo, general manager of the newspaper. “The message of Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and always. That message is needed more now than ever.”

Roxanne King is the editor of the Denver Catholic Register.

JOIN THE MISSION

As the Denver Catholic Register begins its 109th year of service to the Gospel, we invite our readers to purchase an annual voluntary subscription to the newspaper for $25 and receive a gift CD of Archbishop’s Lenten Homilies. Visit www.archden.org/JOIN, call (303) 715-3215 or email info@archden.org.

Donations may be mailed to: DCR Subscription Campaign, Attn: Accounting, 1300 S. Steele St., Denver CO 80210

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