Daily Mirror

The ***Daily Mirror*** is a British newspaper. Founded in 1903, it became a very popular tabloid in the United Kingdom. Though it is less popular today, the _Mirror_ is still published daily.

### Creation

The _Daily Mirror_ was launched on 2 November 1903 by Alfred Harmsworth (later Lord Northcliffe) as a newspaper for women, run by women. Harmsworth intended the newspaper to be "a mirror of feminine life ... entertaining without being frivolous, and serious without being dull". Along with women, he invited men to read the paper, which cost one penny.

### _The Daily Illustrated Mirror_

The newspaper was not an immediate success.  In 1904, Harmsworth decided to turn it into a pictore newspaper. He changed the header to _The Daily Illustrated Mirror_ and made Hamilton Fyfe editor; Fyfe then fired all the women journalists. The paper ran as _The Daily Illustrated Mirror_ from 26 January to 27 April 1904 (issues 72 to 150), then reverted to _The Daily Mirror_.

### The new _Daily Mirror_

Unlike the old _Daily Mirror_, the new version's first issue did not have advertisements on the front page. Instead it featured news text and engraved pictures of a traitor and an actress, with the promise of photographs inside.

Two days later, the price was dropped to one halfpenny, and the tagline "A paper for men and women" was added to the newspaper's masthead (header). This combination was more successful: by issue 92, the guaranteed circulation was 120,000 copies, and by issue 269, it had grown to 200,000:

In 1913 Harmsworth sold the newspaper to his brother Harold Harmsworth (called Lord Rothermere beginning in 1914). Four years later, its price increased back to one penny.

Circulation continued to grow: in 1919, some issues sold more than 1 million copies a day, making _The Daily Mirror_ the largest daily picture paper in the United Kingdom.

### Changes in the 1930s

By the mid 1930s, the _Mirror_ was struggling. With the _Mail_, it had been a main casualty of the early 1930s circulation war that saw the _Daily Herald_ and the _Daily Express_ establish circulations of more than two million. In response, Rothermere sold his shares in the company.

In the late 1930s the paper moved from being a conservative, middle-class newspaper into a left-wing paper for the working class. It became the first British newspaper to adopt the visual style of New York tabloids like the _New York Post_. By 1939, _The Daily Mirror_ was selling 1.4 million copies a day.

### During World War II

The paper was threatened with closure during World War II after Winston Churchill thought one of its cartoons made fun of the British navy.  The cartoon showed a sailor clinging to a piece of wreckage. In fact, the cartoon was attacking the waste of petrol and other goods that sailors were trying to bring across the Atlantic while avoiding Nazi Germany's submarines.

### The 1950s to 2000

Thanks to its working-class readership, the _Mirror_ grew into the United Kingdom's best-selling daily tabloid newspaper.

In 1960 the _Mirror_ bought Odhams Press, a British publishing company, acquiring the _Daily Herald_ (the popular daily paper of the labour movement). This was one of a series of takeovers which created the International Publishing Corporation (IPC).

The _Mirror's_ management did not want the _Herald_ competing with the _Mirror_ for readers. In 1964, they relaunched the _Herald_ as a mid-market paper, now named the _Sun_. When it failed to win readers, the _Sun_ was sold to Rupert Murdoch — who immediately relaunched it as a more populist and sensationalist tabloid that competed directly with the _Mirror_.  In 1978, the _Sun_ overtook the _Mirror_ in circulation, and in 1984 the _Mirror_ was sold to Robert Maxwell.

After Maxwell's death in 1991, the _Mirror_ went through a protracted crisis. Eight years later, it merged with the regional newspaper group Trinity to form Trinity Mirror. Trinity Mirror now prints the daily and Sunday _Mirror_ at Watford and Oldham.

### 21st century

In 2002, the _Mirror_ changed its masthead logo from red to black, because the term "red top" is a name for a sensationalist mass-market tabloid.  At times the logo was blue. On 6 April 2005, the red top came back.

Under then-editor Piers Morgan, the _Mirror_ opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq and ran many front-page articles that criticized the war. It also gave financial support to the 15 February 2003 anti-war protest, paying for a large screen and providing thousands of placards.

On 4 November 2004, after George W. Bush was re-elected as United States President, the _Mirror_ ran a front-page headline titled "How can 59,054,087 people be so DUMB?". It gave a list of states and their average IQs, claiming that states which voted for Bush (except Virginia) were below average, while states that voted for Kerry were average or above. The article cited _The Economist_ as the source for this information, while in fact the list was published as a hoax.

After Piers Morgan resigned in 2004, Richard Wallace became the paper's editor. He was followed by Peter Willis (2012-2018) and Allison Phillips (2018 - present).

In recent years, the paper's circulation has been overtaken by the _Daily Mail's_.

## Editors

- 1903-1904: Mary Howarth
- 1904-1907: Hamilton Fyfe
- 1907-1915: Alexander Kenealy
- 1915-1916: Ed Flynn
- 1916-1931: Alexander Campbell
- 1931-1934: Leigh Brownlee
- 1934-1948: Cecil Thomas
- 1948-1953: Silvester Bolam
- 1953-1961: Jack Nener
- 1961-1971: Lee Howard
- 1971-1974: Tony Miles
- 1974-1975: Michael Christiansen
- 1975-1985: Mike Molloy
- 1985-1990: Richard Stott
- 1990-1991: Roy Greenslade
- 1991-1992: Richard Stott
- 1992-1994: David Banks
- 1994-1985: Colin Myler
- 1995-2004: Piers Morgan
- 2004-2012: Richard Wallace
- 2012-2018: Peter Willis
- 2018-present: Allison Phillips

Source: _Tabloid Nation_ p. 248.