The Exploits of the Kelly Gang Were Not Always Front Page News [Sharon Hollingsworth]

In our modern world we are used to seeing front page newspaper headlines in bold type (and above the fold) screaming out at us with the latest important or sensational news. But back in the heyday of the Kelly Gang that was not always the case.

Looking at the Trove/NLA newspaper site I see that there are 17 papers that had around 1,700 news articles from 1878 to 1880 that featured the Kelly Gang. The major papers listed were the Argus, Brisbane Courier and Sydney Morning Herald. Back in that era many newspapers did not put any news on their front pages.
The [Melbourne] Argus always put advertisements on their front page (these days we are used to those in the back!) back then.
Even when the Kellys were at their most sensational the articles about them were usually several pages further inside!


Coincidentally, during research for this already conceived and nearly finished article I ran across an article from the Argus dated June 3, 1946 called "Newspaper Styles Have Changed Over The Years - The Trend Has Been From Many Words To Few" by Professor A.R. Chisholm in which this was said:

"Even by the 'eighties [1880s], headlines of the type now familiar to newspaper readers had not been evolved. When Ned Kelly was captured, for example, it did not make front-page news. The account of it was set out in the usual small type on page 5 (the front page was sacred to advertisements and notices), with only a few single-column headlines and a note to say that the news had come "By Electric Telegraph."

Well, that seems to confirm what I independently came up with, doesn't it? Don't they say that great minds think alike?  ;)

From what I can glean the only time the Kellys made the front page of the Argus was when there was a supplement periodically published called "Argus Summary for Europe." Other papers had extra supplements now and then that put news of the Kellys in a digest form but those were few and far between.
I have read that the major Australian papers for the most part did not put news on the front page until the time of the First World War. The [Melbourne] Herald started with news on the front in 1889.
Many of the rural papers had been running front page news articles well before then. But even that was a rarity for the Kellys. At Trove I found front page headlines for the Kellys in The Queanbeyan Age, The Mercury, and NT Times and Gazette only about once or twice each.

Looking elsewhere online I found bits about the Kellys from the [Beechworth] Ovens & Murray Advertiser and even then there were only half a dozen times they made the front page.

I have not seen the papers for Jerilderie, but I can imagine they were on the front page for that as it was ground zero for a major exploit!

I guess seeing covers for periodicals like The Illustrated Australian News and The Australasian Sketcher made me think that the Kellys were always front page news.

Another interesting aspect is that at times the reporting on the
Kellys was overshadowed by other (often lesser) events. For instance,
I have read that when there was a cricket "riot" in Sydney involving
cricket legend David Gregory when he was playing against the touring English team and that it commanded more newspaper space than the Kelly Gang raid on Jerilderie did in the SMH.

Speaking of David Gregory, Michael Ball has told me about some
interesting Kelly Gang tie-ins concerning him. David Gregory was said
to have had the most famous beard in Australia up until the emergence
of Ned Kelly in the public eye. Also, Gregory's mother, Mary Ann, was a
sister to John Thomas Smith the seven-time mayor of
Melbourne who was father to 3 daughters (who would be David's cousins)
who had Kelly Gang ties. Helen Smith married Assistant Commissioner of
Police Charles Hope Nicolson, Louisa Smith married Sub-Inspector
Stanhope O'Connor and Catherine Smith (Webb) was on the police special train
with her sister Louisa during the siege of Glenrowan.