Site of James S. Hogg Newspaper

Hogg's first issue of the Longview News appeared in October 1871. It had two pages, came out three days a week on notebook-sized paper and cost $5 a year. His widowed sister, Martha, came from Rusk to help set up the equipment in a small office across from the railroad depot. He promoted education and investment and attacked the Reconstruction administration of Gov. Davis and railroad subsidies. On Christmas morning 1871, at the urging of citizens of Quitman, he moved his press to Wood County, and Longview had no paper until the New Era appeared in 1872.

What the plaque says

Site of James S. Hogg Newspaper Texas' first native governor (1891-1895), James Stephen Hogg, founded here in 1871 his first newspaper, the Longview News. He was then 20 years old. In his paper Hogg was a strong supporter of educational and governmental improvements for Longview. He campaigned against radical reconstruction policies, railroad subsidies, lawlessness. This venture, following earlier apprentice news work, showed Hogg's alertness, self-confidence. He was a publisher for 3 years. This experience developed his qualities of leadership and led to later success as a statesman. (1967)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• East Texas Oil Museum — 11 mi
  A Kilgore College museum that rebuilds the 1930s oil boom in a full-scale Boomtown with a general store, drugstore and newspaper office, plus dioramas, films and antiques given by East Texans.
• New London Museum and Cenotaph — 21 mi
  A volunteer-run museum beside the pink granite cenotaph for the March 1937 school gas explosion, holding a model of the school, a blackboard from that day and an odorizer device.
• Starr Family Home State Historic Site — 22 mi
  Maplecroft, the 1871 Greek Revival house Frank Starr built in Marshall, with Ruth Starr Blake's glass and china, an 1880s kitchen restored in 2019 and a retirement home built for a formerly enslaved person.
• Harrison County Historical Museum — 22 mi
  Galleries in Marshall's 1901 courthouse that run from the Caddo to the present, with Wiley College, Lady Bird Johnson's inaugural gown and a military gallery across the square in Memorial City Hall.

More markers nearby

• Dalton Gang's Last Raid — steps away
• The Courthouses of Gregg County — steps away
• O. H. Methvin, Sr., Founder of Longview — steps away
• 1919 Longview Race Riot — steps away