FAIRHOPE, Alabama— The Fairhope Courier has donated its Chandler & Price printing press to The Fairhope Museum of History.

“This printing press, used to print so much of the early history of Fairhope, will certainly help tell Fairhope’s story,” Museum Director Donnie Barrett said. “Thank you for thinking of the museum with this piece of Fairhope’s past. We will give it a good home and make it available to the Fairhope people.”

The press, which was made in 1901 and used in the early days at The Courier for a variety of printing jobs, could be moved as early as tomorrow, Wednesday, Aug.  15, which would be on the 118^th anniversary of the publication of the first edition of The Fairhope Courier on Aug. 15, 1894.

If the move doesn’t take place tomorrow,, it will be in the near future.

Paul Moxon, a Mobile-based printer who has consulted on the history of the Courier’s Chandler & Price for the paper, disassembled part of the press today so that t would fit through the newspaper’s offrice doors and make the 1,500 pound press easier to roll on a dolly from the Courier office on Fairhope Avenue to the Fairhope Museum of History on Section Street a few blocks away.

Moxon has confirmed that the Courier’s press was made in 1901. Fairhope was founded on the Eastern Shore of Mobile Bay in 1894.

NOTE: Courier Editor Mike Odom will be guest speaker at the Fairhope Museum of History’s popular “Tea for Two” lecture series at 2 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 16, talking and answering questions about The Courier’s history and the role and future of newspapers in society.  For more information, call The Courier at 251-928-2321, or the Museum at 251-929-1474.