For decades, tens of millions of people in small-town America depended on Sunday Grit to tell them the news of the world, long before television became widely available. Sunday Grit correspondents were on hand to record momentous events from a turn-of-the-century city on the rise, through the end of the lumber boom, World War, Depression, to modern times.

Few newspapers can claim to be the first to cover a momentous event, but on June 4, 1939, tucked away on page 31, a small Sunday Grit article reported on “a new hardball league for boys 12 years and under will get under way Tuesday night…” Of course people now know it as Little League Baseball, a game played by countless children and administered by millions of adult volunteers worldwide.

From 1882 through 1996, Sunday Grit was on hand to record America’s — and the world’s — history. And, with millions of readers throughout the United States, it also had the power to influence politics, local and national. Many people miss Sunday Grit, which brought homespun news to their doorsteps each week, along with favorite comic strips, advice columns, recipes, patterns, news of celebrities, as well as human-interest features and thunderous editorials.