A History of News Design, part 1

In the beginning, there was news, but there wasn't design. At least not much.

Back when concerned citizens first started newspapers, the idea was to get information out, not to make it look good. Since newspapers was the primary source of information, editors took for granted that citizens would read it. The front page didn't have to be eye-catching.

This front page is from 1964. A lot of people probably read it back then, when no other news source was available, but if The BG News tried to pull a design like this today, not many would read it.

That's a lot of text, and it doesn't flow well. Nearly every story is L-shaped, and L-shapes are tough for readers' eyes to follow. Also, there are about nine stories on the front. Today, most newspapers get away with three or four longer stories because big photos, big headlines, big design takes up space.

Actually, most of the tricks newspapers use today to get readers' attentions are not present: Big photos, punchy headlines, even bylines are absent.

But many of these differences come from how the paper was put together. Not many photos were used because it was so much more difficult back then to apply photos to the giant sheets of metal they sent to the printer (again, more about process later).

Design didn't actually start to change until the rise of the computer. The creative, design-heavy front pages seen today weren't possible without programs like InDesign and PhotoShop.

A History of News Design, part 2 coming soon