From Woody's Couch

Lantern front page, 1881

This week marks the 100th year that The Lantern, OSU’s award-winning student newspaper became a classroom laboratory for journalism students to learn how to report and write the news on a daily basis. Its origins, though, were much more literary.

In January 1881, Volume 1, No. 1 of The Lantern appeared. Its editors picked the name after “La Lanterne,” a popular French magazine published in Paris at the time, and it started as a monthly appearing during the academic year only. In the initial issue, the editors promised to “represent the interests of our institution and student life as we find them.” And that’s been the goal ever since.

When it started, the newspaper was more like a literary magazine, publishing essays, and other writings that were submitted to the staff. In 1884, the newspaper began to appear every two weeks, and it was published by the Alcyone, Horton and Browning Literary societies. Seven years later, in 1891, the publication became a weekly.

Lantern students, 1914

The next year, members of the literary societies managing The Lantern decided to breathe new life into the publication and changed the name to “Wahoo.” Alumni were not so keen about the change apparently and demanded the return of the old name. The then-“Wahoo” editors seemed perplexed in a Nov. 29, 1892 editorial: “Since so few of the alumni formerly subscribed for the paper, it was surprising to see the sudden interest manifested when the name was changed. So “The Lantern” returned to the masthead – just 20 issues after “Wahoo” had appeared.

In 1914, journalism students took over the newspaper and it became a daily. Over the years, it has covered all kinds of historic moments on campus, from presidential inaugurations to student riots to NCAA championships.

To mark its historic 100th anniversary, we decided to give snippets of what appeared on the front page of the inaugural daily Lantern:

Lantern front page: September 15, 1914

A now-forgotten OSU tradition called Cane Rush – where the freshman class and sophomore class battle to get a cane over the other’s goal line (sort of a combination of football and rugby) – would be held on Ohio Field that week. Strict new rules were in place to prevent winning by “strategy;” apparently, the year before, the sophomore class won when “Karl McComb dressed as a janitor walked down the cinder track with the cane concealed and climbed the goal posts on the freshman end of the field before the freshman discovered him.”

The Women’s Council was trying something new by providing each female freshman a “Big Sister” from the junior and senior classes. Each of these advisors had been given a name of three freshmen expected to enter OSU and had arranged to meet them at the train depot and help them secure lodging and finalize their class schedules. They would also introduce them to upper-class members and other freshmen. “By means of this every freshman girl will get started in school with little or no trouble or worry to herself.”

And finally, the staff reported that the honor of being the first to subscribe to the Daily Lantern went to Lowry F. Sater, president of the Ohio State University Association. In a letter to the newspaper that enclosed a check for his year’s subscription, Lowry wrote: “May your stock of oil never run low. I hope the Lantern will outshine any other luminary of its kind.”

Interested in seeing past articles of The Lantern? Go to the Lantern Archives and browse to your heart’s content. You’ll learn a LOT about OSU history along the way.