WINONA. Minn. – The Winona Post celebrated its 50h year with articles of reminisces from co-founder Fran Edstrom and others and a review of half a century of successes and setbacks. The Post began in 1971 as a free-distribution advertising sheet. There wasn’t much news to start, but the Post evolved into a personality-driven sheet. Although amateurish to start, the paper matured into the major conveyor of local news.

Personality-driven

Fran won readers’ hearts in chronicling her own lengthy bout with cancer. Her co-founder and husband, John, had spicy front-page tangles with Mayor Jerry Miller. The Post became a spectator sport. Much of the Post in those days was unorthodox, but advertisers and readers cottoned to it. Over the years Post grew in statur , aided partly by the gradual decline of the once dominant Winona Daily News. The Post, however, had foibles along the way. John’s football enthusiasm for the Vikings self-indulgently ate up space that could and should have gone into local news coverage. Fran went into tizzy when a campus weekly out of Winina State University ran a scoop that the Econofoods grocery chain, a major Post advertiser, was closing its Winona store. The store manager was incensed at the leak – and Fran reflexively curried favor from Econofoods by going to the herfront page to discredit the campus journalists. The egg, however, ended up on Fran’s face. Econofoods soon announced it indeed was shuttering the Winona store. The Post had a major setback in 1985 when its star columnist, Jerome Christenson, was hired away by the Daily News. Even so, the Post proved nimble in ways the Daily News didn’t to the changing business climate for U.S. newspapers.

Change of hands

John died in 2012. Two years later Fran sold the paper to Patrick Marek, who once  had worked for them but who had since departed for radio sales at KWNO. The Post was twice weekly by then. Marek deftly switched back to once-a-week in the Covid pandemic and beefed up the paper’s online presence. Under editors Sarah Squires and Chris Rogers, the news content grew in importance.

Sweethearts from college. Fran from the College of St. Teresa and John from Saint Mary’s University.

First issue. November 3, 1971.

Quaint downtown presence. Gutenburg technology lives on with on-site printing press.