42 – Buffalo Bulletin, Heritage 2019
Continued from 9 shortage of help compelled him to work long
wrote. “We do not know what excuse can be
given for starting such reports. … These men
(the Livestock Association) prattle about a
reign of terror, but the only such reign rages
in their own breasts.”
The cattle war also marked the begin-
ning of the end of De Barthe’s newspaper
career. Shortly after the battle at the T.A.
Ranch, De Barthe left the Bulletin and there
are tales of him losing weight and drinking
heavily. Later in life, De Barthe went on to
author the well-regarded book “The Life and
Adventures of Frank Grouard.”
If it came at a great personal cost to him-
self, De Barthe’s work with the paper was
well-regarded. In an October 1891 “Sheridan
Enterprise,” the editor wrote that the Bulletin
was “an ably edited and handsomely gotten
up paper, and deserves the great prosperity it
enjoys.”
“Long before De Barthe has been inducted into the
Wyoming Press Association Hall of Fame
computers, and lives on in the heart of Bulletin staff,
according to current publisher and owner
newspapers were Robb Hicks.
produced with a “Joe De Barthe put his life on the line to
report the news,” Robb said in 2015. “He
labor-intensive was a mover and a shaker.”
~ “As was the case in other parts of the
process known Thursday, December 18, 1941 –
“The nation’s capital has settled down to
as ‘hot type.’ the grim task of defeating the Axis powers in
the Pacific. From one end of Pennsylvania
The type was Avenue to the other, all partisan differences
have been laid aside. The entire nation is
created from united, as it never has been before, in the
face of its common danger. … This may be
molten lead the silver lining to the black clouds which are
gathering.”
by machines ~
After De Barthe’s exit from the paper, F.C.
called linotypes. Newell took over management of the Bulletin
until severing his connections with the paper
These had in 1899.
Following Newell’s departure, the Bulletin
gas-fired lead was purchased by Frank E. Lucas, a young
Iowa resident who had just moved to the
pots which were community earlier that year. Lucas’ career as
never all that a publisher and editor continued for nearly
45 years from 1899 to 1945. Frank’s father,
well ventilated.” A.G., filled in for a year in 1900 while his
son Vance operated the paper in 1944.
— Jim Hicks In addition to providing news to the peo-
ple of Johnson County, Frank was an active
civil servant in other ways. In 1915, he was
elected to represent Johnson County in the
Wyoming House of Representatives, and in
1919, he was elected to the state senate. In
1923, Frank was elected secretary of state,
and he served as acting governor for a year
after the death of Gov. William Ross in 1924.
He also was chairman of the local selective
service board during World War II.
Despite all his other commitments, Frank
never missed a paper, according to his obit-
uary.
“One of the finest tributes that can be paid
to the former Bulletin publisher was that in
46 years he never failed to publish a weekly
issue,” the obituary said. “During the war, a
hours in order to serve the community with a
newspaper. … Chances are that Frank Lucas
would have died in his editor’s chair had not
the handicaps of five war years fatigued him
mentally and physically to the point that he
chose to sell his paper and take life easier.”
Frank saw multiple evolutions in printing
technology during his tenure at the paper.
About a year after he purchased the
Bulletin, a Simplex typesetting machine was
purchased. Linotypes soon followed, and in
1926, a Model 14 was added to the equip-
ment. This allowed production for different
sizes of type without hand-setting.
The county itself also saw numerous
changes during the Lucas family’s tenure at
the paper. The Old West of lore slowly disap-
peared and two world wars came and went,
but the Lucases remained.
“He (Frank) came to Buffalo when it was
a mere village of 700 people and has helped
it grow into an outstanding town of the
state,” Theodore James “Jim” Gatchell wrote
in a Dec. 2, 1948, editorial on Frank Lucas.
“He always found time to help his friends
and will be sadly missed by a vast number.
To know Frank was to like him.”
~
Thursday, November 28, 1963 –
United States and around the world, the
news of the assassination of President John
F. Kennedy hit Buffalo and the surrounding
area like a bombshell.
“Women at home with the television sets
were the first to get the news a few minutes
after Lee H. Oswald shot the president. …
“Phones began ringing all over Buffalo.
One lady called the Bulletin, and immediately
three more calls were received. During the
noon hour of that black Friday in history,
the announcement that President John F.
Kennedy had died was made.”
~
Printing technology has evolved over the
years, but work conditions were once bad
enough that “an OSHA inspector would turn
flips today,” according to former publisher
and owner Jim Hicks.
“Long before computers, newspapers
were produced with a labor-intensive process
known as ‘hot type’,” Jim recalled on the
occasion of the Bulletin’s 125th anniversary
in 2009. “The type was created from molten
lead by machines called linotypes. These had
gas-fired lead pots which were never all that
well ventilated.”
Despite this, Jim was hard at work at the
Bulletin long before he even had a driver’s
license.
“It started when I was in grade school
when I was taught how to use a broom, how
to ‘catch’ the papers as they came off the end
of a contraption called the ‘Omaha Folder,’
and remelt lead used in the printing process
of that era,” Jim said.
Jim’s father Frank Hicks had been hired as
Bulletin editor by A.A. Schlaht in 1947 after
Schlaht purchased the paper from the Lucas
family. In 1956, Frank purchased the Bulletin
from Schlaht.
A career newsman, Frank was born in