DEARBORN — On Sunday, October 26, Dearborn’s Press & Guide will publish its final issue, marking the end of more than a century of continuous publication. The newspaper announced the decision in an email to subscribers, citing “changes in the business model and rising operating costs.”

Founded in 1918 as the Dearborn Press, the paper became a fixture in the community, documenting generations of local news, milestones and civic life. It later merged with the Dearborn Guide in 1976, adopting its current name — Press & Guide. Since 2004, it has been published twice weekly, on Wednesdays and Sundays.

With its closure, The Arab American News, published weekly in both Arabic and English since January 1985, will become the oldest continuously operating newspaper in Dearborn.

A legacy of local Journalism

In its early decades, the Dearborn Press competed fiercely with other hometown papers, including the Dearborn Independent, which was owned by auto magnate Henry Ford. As Dearborn grew, so did the newspaper, often through acquisitions of rival publications that came and left over the years.

The Press & Guide chronicled the evolution of the city through periods of industrial expansion, demographic change and political transformation, serving Dearborn’s diverse residents.

Corporate ownership and national trends

Today, the Press & Guide is owned by MediaNews Group, a Denver-based publishing company that owns more than 70 daily newspapers, including The Detroit News — and more than 150 weeklies nationwide.

MediaNews Group itself is controlled by the Alden Global Capital hedge fund, headquartered in Manhattan, New York. Alden has gained national attention for aggressive cost-cutting measures that have led to newsroom closures across the country.

The company also announced the shutdown of two other Metro Detroit weeklies — the New Baltimore Voice in Macomb County and the Royal Oak Tribune in Oakland County, as part of a broader industry contraction affecting local print journalism nationwide.

Industry observers say the move may reflect an effort to consolidate resources and focus on larger outlets like the Detroit News and the Oakland Press, following the end of a joint operating agreement with the Detroit Free Press.
(Detroit Free Press, Oct. 15, 2025)

The shrinking landscape of local news

A 2024 report by the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University, titled “The State of Local News”, found that more than 3,200 printed newspapers have disappeared across the United States since 2005 — an average loss of more than two per week.
(Medill Local News Initiative, 2024)

As newspapers continue to close, communities like Dearborn face critical questions: Who will tell their stories, report on local government or connect residents to one another? And how will democracy thrive without credible, professional sources of information as social media platforms become the default news source for many Americans?

An end of an era

For generations of Dearborn residents, the Press & Guide was more than a newspaper — it was a community institution, reflecting the lives, struggles and triumphs of its readers. Its closure marks not just the end of a publication, but the passing of an era in local journalism.

As Dearborn turns the page, the responsibility of chronicling its evolving story will fall increasingly on remaining outlets, including The Arab American News, which continues to serve as a bridge between communities and cultures, locally and nationally.