Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
When the Clovis News-Journal moved into its newly constructed building at 521 Pile in the summer of 1947, it boasted of venetian blinds, concrete floors, asphalt tile floor coverings, acoustical ceilings and air-conditioning.
That was the report on the newspaper's front page the day before it hosted a community open house on July 26, 1947.
The lot at 521-523 Pile had previously been occupied by the Presbyterian Church, which was established by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway in 1907. The church building was razed and its congregation moved to 1101 Pile in 1946.
The Clovis News was first printed in a tent on May 1, 1907. It was part of multiple merges over the next two decades and was housed in multiple locations, including the Awalt building that still stands on Main Street from 1909 to 1916.
Clovis' only newspaper – the Clovis News-Journal – was at 219 N. Main when it moved to Pile Street where it remains today as The Eastern New Mexico News.
The building is largely unchanged since its construction – light-colored brick, fitted with aluminum windows and door frames outlined by glass blocks.
Cost to construct the newspaper office and its new printing press were estimated at $100,000. The press could print one color and was capable of printing 40,000 papers per hour, CNJ reported.
We don't have a printing press anymore; papers are printed in Santa Fe. Those original trees out front and on the north side near the back are long gone. And we're waiting in line for some of our 76-year-old windows, broken by tennis ball-size hail on May 24, to be repaired.
But we're still standing.
David Stevens is publisher of Clovis Media Inc. Email him at:
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