Two hundred so far

I used to throw the Charleston Evening Post into ninety-one yards six days a week. It wasn't much fun, but it did teach me the importance of drudgery as a means of putting coins in my pocket, and besides, I didn't have to get up at three in the morning to throw The News and Courier.

As in many other cities, co-owned morning and evening papers were fused into one. But if this fuzzes up the family tree a bit, well, one thing is clear: the original Charleston Courier put out its first edition on 10 January 1803, and today's Post and Courier is celebrating its 200th birthday. As a former reader and, um, independent contractor, I tip my hat to the paper that did as much as any single publication to teach me to read, both the lines of type and the messages in between.