This was the Canberra Times boast on 22 November 2013:
Canberra learned of the assassination of US president John F. Kennedy exactly 50 years ago - after a whole edition of The Canberra Times was overhauled and reprinted in the early hours of what otherwise would have been an unremarkable Saturday.
It was the only newspaper in Australia to report the story on November 23, 1963. Journalists and printers were called back to work when a taxi driver happened to ask editor David Bowman for news of the 46-year-old leader's possible assassination in Texas.
The boast was duly reported in the December 2013 Australian Newspaper History Group [ANHG] newsletter:
75.4.11 Reporting the assassination of JFK
A whole edition of the Canberra Times was overhauled and reprinted in the early hours of Saturday, 23 November 1963. The Canberra Times has claimed (22 November 2013) it was the only newspaper in Australia to report that day the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy. Journalists and printers were called back to work at the Canberra Times when a taxi driver happened to ask editor David Bowman for news of the 46-year-old leader’s possible assassination in Texas. Just hours before, Kennedy’s motorcade had flashed past huge crowds in downtown Dallas and into the range of assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, perched on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository.
Ian Mathews, a subeditor at the newspaper in 1963 and later the editor-in-chief, said: “The print run at the Mort Street office and printery would have been about 2am or 3am … The main body of printers, apart from those who had headed home, gathered in the bindery for their ritual Friday night-Saturday morning poker game.” The news was reported just after 4.30am, prompting only momentary shock from Bowman and chief subeditor Frank Hamilton who snapped to action. ‘‘The radio was switched on; AAP, who supplied the newspaper with foreign news, was called; the single teleprinter was turned on again. And the news began to flow,’’ Mathews said. ‘‘To print a new edition Bowman needed printers and he found them playing poker. On any other night it would have been different.’’
Returning for a shift on the subeditors’ desk on Sunday afternoon, Mathews helped fit news of the tragedy into a Monday edition, alongside weekly fixtures including local sport results and the television guide. ‘‘As usual we ran late. This was fortunate because just after 3.30am Canberra time, [nightclub owner] Jack Ruby shot Harvey Oswald – and once again we rushed to produce a second edition,’’ he said. [Trove does not have the second edition of the Canberra Times of 23 November 1963.]
Then the letters began to arrive at ANHG and according to Rod Kirkpatrick the boast was shot down in flames:
Ken Sanz wrote:
I am glad you used the word “claimed” in the Canberra Times article on the death of JF Kennedy, and being the only paper printed with this news on Saturday.
It may have been the only morning newspaper to print this, but it was not the only paper to print this news on the Saturday 23 November 1963. Both the Daily Mirror and The Sun usually went out at 10am each Saturday. Admittedly they were only 16 pages tabloid, but on this day they produced their first editions at 9 a.m. and followed this during the day!
My source for this is my memory because I was there as an apprentice for the Sun-Herald and when I arrived at 8 a.m. the Sun compositors and editorial were already on duty and rushing about to get the paper out early to beat The Daily Mirror. I checked this with Gavin Souter’s “Company of Heralds” page 523.
I also suspect that the Saturday early editions of the Saturday night and Sunday newspapers also printed on Saturday from before 6 pm of this news for country readers.
Kim Lockwood wrote:
Meanwhile, the Canberra Times cannot be allowed to get away with its claim that it was "the only newspaper in Australia to report that day [22/11/63] the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy".
I know for a fact the Melbourne Sun News-Pictorial put out a late edition, having recalled several staff from home. And what does the Times have to say about the afternoon papers across the country (Saturday afternoon papers were still printed in the capitals)? The Herald, Melbourne, splashed with two decks on the front:
PRES KENNEDY
ASSASSINATED
Others did something similar.
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