The history of Freedom Communications

Freedom Communications, the company that owned The Sun Journal for nearly 40 years, grew out of a newspaper operation started by two brothers in Ohio during the early years of the 20th century.

Raymond Cyrus Hoiles, known as R.C. and the man who founded Freedom, went to work for and soon became partners with his brother Frank in owning newspapers in Alliance, Lorain and Mansfield, Ohio. R.C. later became sole owner of the Lorain and Mansfield papers and in 1927 acquired another Ohio paper, the Bucyrus Telegraph-Forum.

Shortly thereafter, R.C. became embroiled in a long and bitter battle with a local newspaper rival that included several attempts on his life, including the explosion of a bomb on his front porch. By 1932, the threats and bombings in addition to the competitive climate became so tense that R.C. sold the Lorain and Mansfield newspapers and temporarily closed his door on the business.

He made a fresh start in 1935, moving his family to Santa Ana, Calif., after acquiring the newspaper there, the Register. In this job and in this political climate, R.C. Hoiles began to formalize the philosophy that was to guide his life and the work of his growing newspaper company.

The political and personal philosophy that came to be known as libertarian a term that antedated R.C.s own awakening was, for him, built on principles found in the Ten Commandments, the Golden Rule and the Declaration of Independence. These beliefs were shared and debated with readers in a public dialogue rooted in columns and editorials he wrote for the Register.

As a libertarian, R.C. Hoiles objected to coercion of any type, including the governments power of taxation. He believed that the only legitimate function of government is the protection of its citizens against fraud and force, and that all other government-run programs should be replaced by free enterprise and voluntary actions.

That was the message shared over decades by newspapers brought into the company that in 1950 was incorporated as Freedom Newspapers. By 1970, the year R.C. died, Freedom Newspapers had grown to 16 dailies scattered over seven states.

In 1973, The Free Press became the second newspaper in North Carolina after the Gazette in Gastonia acquired by Freedom. The next year, Freedom acquired the Sun Journal in New Bern and in 1977, the Daily News in Jacksonville. These dailies formed the basis of the operating group known as Freedom ENC Communications, which also included news websites and weeklies like the Havelock News and the Jones Post.

Clarence Harrison Hoiles, the eldest son, succeeded R.C. as the companys chief executive until his death in 1981. The 1980s saw diversification into television with the acquisition of five stations and Freedom created a magazine division in 1993. The Holies family maintained control of the company until 2010, despite a rift among siblings in 2004 that saw Freedom partner with private equity firms in order to create a recapitalization opportunity for those family members who wanted to sell their shares.

The debt created for the company by this and other developments resulted in Freedom filing voluntary petitions for reorganization under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code in September 2009. The company emerged from bankruptcy the next April and soon after announced the naming of a new board of directors, a board bereft of Hoiles family representation for the first time.

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The history of Freedom Communications