A Liberal, half penny daily newspaper, founded in Darlington in 1870. It was started by John Hyslop Bell at the behest of local industrial magnates, the Peases, largely to counter the political outpourings of rival newspapers, the Darlington & Stockton Times and the Darlington Mercury.
The Echo enjoyed early success under its second editor, W.T. Stead, who brought the paper international notoriety during the Bulgarian Atrocities agitation in 1876. Gladstone and other leading Liberals became great admirers and the historian E.A. Freeman went so far as to declare the Echo, "the best paper in Europe." However, the loss of Stead to the Pall Mall Gazette in 1880 and the resignation of founder John Hyslop Bell in 1889, took a heavy toll on the Echo and its sales slumped to a critical low for decades after. The collapse of the Pease dynasty and increased competition from rival newpapers added to the Echo's troubles and, by the time it limped into the twentieth century, it was on the verge of bankrupcy.
It was saved from ruin in 1903, when it was acquired by the North of England Newspaper Company, a group owned by chocolateers Rowntree. A further takeover by Westminster Press (also known as the Starmer Group) in 1921 secured the Echo's future and it remains today one of the longest-serving newspapers in north-eastern England.
Owen Mulpetre © 2006
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