FAIRHOPE, Alabama—The shared history of Fairhope and its community newspaper The Courier is a unique one.

The idea for both the city and paper began, not on the Eastern Shore of Mobile Bay, but in Des Moines, Iowa, where the town’s founders envisioned this scenic place with “a fair hope of success” and the first few issues of The Fairhope Courier were published.

When that intrepid group gathered here 119 years ago on Nov. 15, 1894, and founded the new town of Fairhope, The Courier also found its permanent home in Baldwin County, where it has published continuously since its first issue.

On Nov. 16, a large part of that shared history—about 1,500 pounds worth—found a new home when the press was moved a few city blocks from the storeroom of The Courier’s office on Fairhope Avenue to the ground floor of the Fairhope Museum of History on Section Street.

Built in 1901, the mammoth and venerable Chandler and Price printing press was donated to the museum this year by Gulf Coast Newspapers, the Robertsdale-based company that publishes The Courier and its four sister papers in Baldwin County: The Baldwin Times in Bay Minette, The Independent in Robertsdale, The Onlooker in Foley, and The Islander in Gulf Shores and Orange Beach.

Using a pallet jack, flatbed truck and some creative moving skills in the tight corners of the museum, it took a crew of four GCN staff to move the heavy press to the place where it will become the centerpiece of a permanent display about the life and times of the early years of the newspaper and city.

“The Fairhope Museum of History is quite pleased to have this wonderful old piece of our history added to our collection,” said Donnie Barrett, the museum’s director. “It will make a very nice permanent exhibit, telling of the newspaper and the first days of our city.”

Ernest B. Gaston, Fairhope’s founder and the paper’s first editor, published The Fairhope Courier for over 30 years. Three of his children, Frankie, Corney and Spider (Francis Lily, Cornelius Alonzo, Arthur Fairhope) took over after their father retired, Barrett said.

“A great-grandchild, Melinda Melachrino, who now lives in Florida, happened to visit the day the press was moved and told us this was called ‘Spider's press,’” Barrett said. “She said they had another like this one and both printed The Courier up until 1962. She said she hand-caught papers coming off this press.  Lead type found in the press just before moving indicated it was used to print advertisement inserts during the 1970s.”

The Courier’s Chandler and Price was made in 1901, according to Paul Moxon, a Mobile-based printer, teacher and expert in printing press history who examined the press and helped prepare it for the move.

“It will need a good cleaning first,” Barrett said, about preparing the press for its permanent display. “We will then give it a thin coat of linseed oil to protect it and give it a polished look.  We will set some type up and set the ink rollers up to appear as though it were in use and put some blank paper in the carriage.  Behind the press we will tell the history of the newspaper and tell the history that we know of the press itself.”

Last month, The Fairhope Courier was combined with The Bulletin, which covered the Daphne and Spanish Fort area. Now covering all of the Eastern Shore and called The Courier, the newspaper continues to publish twice a week on Tuesdays and Fridays.

“The Courier has a rich history of reporting and chronicling the stories of this great community,” said Sudie Gambrell, GCN publisher. “We are honored to donate our Chandler and Price printing press to the Fairhope Museum of History, so the people of Fairhope and those who visit can envision the newspaper’s history and the role it has played in Fairhope for more than a century.”