TWO newspaper chains before football season?

There may be only TWO major newspaper chains left in America before football season starts!

Six months ago, there were five: Gannett, New Media’s GateHouse, McClatchy, Tribune Publishing and Alden’s MNG Enterprises.

Today, there are four when GateHouse swallowed Gannett but kept the Gannett name.

Gannett stock has freefallen to EIGHTY EIGHT CENTS a share. That makes it a penny stock.

Tribune and MNG are expected to merge by June.

Staggering McClatchy is a prime target for Gannett or a merged Tribune/MNG.

In 1995 there were TWENTY newspaper chains. It took only 25 years to wipe out nearly all of them.

Listing them in order of their circulation totals there were Gannett, Knight-Ridder, Newhouse, Times Mirror, Dow Jones, New York Times, Thomson, Hearst, Cox, Tribune, E.W. Scripps, Hollinger, McClatchy, Freedom, MediaNews, Washington Post, Central, Morris, Capital Cities/ABC and Copley.

Vanished like the horse and buggy. But far more important to democracy.