My Genealogy Hound

CHARLES W. SPENCE, senior editor, publisher and proprietor of the Kearny County Democrat, is a native of Fulton county, Ill. and was born April 6, 1865. He is the fifth of eight children born to William and Caroline (Ruble) Spence, now of Fulton county. He is a newspaper man by choice and long years of training. He left home at the age of ten and went to Peoria, Ill., where he learned the “art preservative” on the Transcript of that place, and then, at the age of fifteen, he started on the road as a journeyman printer. He traveled for some years, working in different localities and gathering a knowledge of his business and of the world, pulling up in 1881 at Lincoln, this state, where he held a place as compositor for some time on the State Journal. Leaving there, he went to Alma, Harlan county, where he published the Alma Times for about six months. Returning to Lincoln, he was again engaged on the journal for six months longer, going thence in January, 1886, to Minden, Kearney county, where he, in company with H. H. Dunkle, bought the Kearney County Democrat, continuing its publication under the firm name of Spence & Dunkle, till the summer of 1889. At that date H. W. Mackey bought Mr. Dunkle’s interest, and the firm became Spence & Mackey, and has continued so since. The Democrat is a six-column quarto weekly, democratic in politics, and is devoted to the interests of Minden, Kearney county, and the great southwest of Nebraska. It is a live, progressive, newsy sheet, the champion of the right, and the uncompromising enemy of the wrong; free, fearless and without favor in dealing with public questions. It is the exponent of the best thought of the times, and the leader in all public enterprises in the community where it is published. It has a large and constantly increasing circulation, and is popular with the citizens of Kearney county, even among those who differ widely with it in political faith, and even on some matters of public policy. Messrs. Spence & Mackey, in addition to their newspaper interest, have built up a large job department, turning out constantly an immense amount of job work of a superior quality. Their paper is the official organ of the county and they do all the public printing for the county. Few have ever visited the town of Minden who have not heard of the Democrat. Many have heard of it who never saw the town. The citizens in the community where it is published have every reason to be proud of it.