For ninety-one years, The Mahoning Dispatch served Canfield and the surrounding communities, becoming the oldest continuously published newspaper owned by a single family in Mahoning County. Its first weekly edition appeared on May 4, 1877, with a yearly subscription price of $1.50 paid in advance. Founded by Canfield native and Civil War veteran Henry Manning Fowler, it was first located at the corner of East Main and Broad streets. In 1893, the business moved to a building erected by Pierpont Edwards in 1866 as a grocery store. The paper was among the first printers in the area to buy a linotype composing machine, replacing hand-set type. Published by three generations of the Fowler family, it ended in 1968 while retaining its country-paper character.