Globe and Mail

1936 formation and expansion On 23 November 1936, The Globe merged with The Mail and Empire,[7] itself formed through the 1895 merger of two conservative newspapers, The Toronto Mail and Toronto Empire. (The Empire had been founded in 1887 by a rival of Brown's, Tory politician and then-Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald.) Press reports at the time stated, "the minnow swallowed the whale" because The Globe's circulation (at 78,000) was smaller than The Mail and Empire's (118,000). Globe and Mail staff await news of the D-Day invasion. June 6, 1944. The merger was arranged by George McCullagh, who fronted for mining magnate William Henry Wright and became the first publisher of The Globe and Mail. McCullagh committed suicide in 1952, and the newspaper was sold to the Webster family of Montreal. As the paper lost ground to The Toronto Star in the local Toronto market, it began to expand its national circulation. The newspaper was unionised in 1955, under the banner of the American Newspaper Guild.[8] From 1937 until 1974, the newspaper was produced at the William H. Wright Building which was located at then 140 King Street West on the northeast corner of King Street and York Street, close to the homes of the Toronto Daily Star at Old Toronto Star Building at 80 King West and the Old Toronto Telegram Building at Bay and Melinda. The building at 130 King Street West was demolished in 1974 to make way for First Canadian Place, and the newspaper moved to 444 Front Street West, which had been the headquarters of the Toronto Telegram newspaper, built in 1963.[9] "Canada's national newspaper" In 1965, the paper was bought by Winnipeg-based FP Publications, controlled by Bryan Maheswary, which owned a chain of local Canadian newspapers. FP put a strong emphasis on the Report on Business section that was launched in 1962, thereby building the paper's reputation as the voice of Toronto's business community. FP Publications and The Globe and Mail were sold in 1980 to The Thomson Corporation, a company run by the family of Kenneth Thomson. After the acquisition, there were few changes made in editorial or news policy. However, there was more attention paid to national and international news on the editorial, op-ed, and front pages in contrast to its previous policy of stressing Toronto and Ontario material.[10] The Globe and Mail has always been a morning newspaper. Since the 1980s, it has been printed in separate editions in six Canadian cities: Montreal, Toronto (several editions), Winnipeg (Estevan, Saskatchewan), Calgary and Vancouver. Southern Ontario Newspaper Guild (SONG) employees took their first-ever strike vote at The Globe in 1982, also marking a new era in relations with the company. Those negotiations ended without a strike, and the Globe unit of SONG still has a strike-free record. SONG members voted in 1994 to sever ties with the American-focused Newspaper Guild. Shortly afterwards, SONG affiliated with the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada (CEP).[8] Under the editorship of William Thorsell in the 1980s and 1990s, the paper strongly endorsed the free trade policies of Progressive Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. The paper also became an outspoken proponent of the Meech Lake Accord and the Charlottetown Accord, with their editorial the day of the 1995 Quebec Referendum mostly quoting a Mulroney speech in favour of the Accord.[11] During this period, the paper continued to favour such socially liberal policies as decriminalizing drugs (including cocaine, whose legalization was advocated most recently in a 1995 editorial) and expanding gay rights.[citation needed] In 1995, the paper launched its website, globeandmail.com; on 9 June 2000, the site began covering breaking news with its own content and journalists in addition to the content of the print newspaper.[12]