York, Clover weekly newspaper prints final edition

The final edition of the (York/Clover) Enquirer-Herald, a weekly McClatchy Co.-owned newspaper that covers western York County, is available Dec. 24.

The Enquirer-Herald and its predecessors, the Yorkville Enquirer and The Clover Herald, have been serving the region’s readers and advertisers for 160 years.

However, as announced earlier this month, the Enquirer-Herald, published each Thursday, will cease publication after the Dec. 24 issue. The final commemorative edition features a look at the newspapers and their history.

Nancy Sambets, an archivist with the Historical Center of York County, where early editions of both newspapers are kept or stored on microfilm, said they provide a unique snapshot of their communities.

“Being able to look back at these older newspapers, you get a sense of the community that you are not going to find anywhere else,” Sambets said.

Although the Enquirer-Herald had remained profitable, the company said the return on investment did not justify the effort required to continue operations.

The Yorkville Enquirer was established in 1855, a granddaddy compared to its younger sister paper, The Clover Herald, which began 74 years later, in 1929.

The two papers merged in March 2007 to become the Enquirer-Herald.

The York newspaper has the distinction of being published longer than any other nondaily newspaper in South Carolina, according to the 1998 “Palmetto Press: A History of South Carolina Newspapers,” published by the S.C. Press Association.

McClatchy Co. of Sacramento, Calif., has owned the newspapers since 1990; it bought the York and Clover newspapers as part of its purchase of The Herald in Rock Hill.

The Enquirer-Herald’s sister community publications, the Lake Wylie Pilot and the Fort Mill Times, will continue to be published.

This story was originally published December 23, 2015 at 4:29 PM with the headline "York, Clover weekly newspaper prints final edition."