It is a source of regret to learn that the Westliche Post, eighty-one-year-old St. Louis German language newspaper, has been forced to suspend. High overhead, high taxes, the Depression, mounting costs of newsprint and other expenses were factors which contributed to its suspension.
Another vital factor, according to Editor J. Otto Pfeiffer, was the paper’s attempt to maintain a neutral editorial stand in the controversy over the present German government. As a result, Nazi sympathizers accused it of being Communistic and their opponents accused it of being Nazi. Caught between the crossfire, subscriptions and advertising fell off.
With the suspension of the Westliche Post, St. Louis will be without a German language newspaper for the first time in 103 years. Prior to last June, when it became a weekly, it was the oldest daily newspaper in the city. And during its long life, it upheld the finest journalistic and German traditions.
The Star-Times salutes a colleague as it passes on.
(Published in the St. Louis Star-Times 9/19/1938)