THE Sunday Post, which is celebrating its 90th birthday this week, has always prided itself on being a campaigning newspaper, and its first campaign was launched was during World War Two, which it called ‘The Blue Light’.
The tabloid flagship of the newspaper division of the Dundee-based DC Thomson publishing empire marked its birthday with a three-page spread which included congratulatory messages from a host of prominent people, including Prime Minister, Gordon Brown.
Throughout this week, allmediascotland.com has been taking a behind-the-scenes look at this remarkable newspaper – in its own words.
The Sunday Post explains the backdrop to The Blue Light thus: “In areas above Clydebank, Greenock and Port Glasgow there were vast stocks of whisky in bonded warehouses. They held millions of gallons of spirit. One was bombed – and the spirit ran down the gutters, alight with a blue flame.
“We wondered what would happen if the others were bombed. The blazing spirit would have poured down into busy housing areas crammed with people. We campaigned and got the stocks moved to safer areas.”
Later, came the Tay Road Bridge campaign. The newspaper reports: “We pressed the Government week after week to build a bridge from Fife into Dundee, linking the Kingdom not just to the city, but to Aberdeen and the north. We won that one too.”
And there was the A9 road from Perth to Inverness. “The A9 was a killer road. We drove up the road with the Scottish Secretary and pinpointed garages where dozens of crashed cars lay stockpiled. He took our concerns on board and the new A9 was created.
“We also successfully campaigned on behalf of the victims of Valium – men and women who had been prescribed the drug for far too long and were suffering acute depression. The good work has continued into the 21st century.”
APOLOGIES: the rest of this entry is unavailable, most likely because of a corrupted database.
