Published: May 13, 2009 07:58 am      

Newspaper Project gets animated with cartoons

The Newspaper Project, the grassroots organization launched in February to support a constructive exchange of information and ideas about the future of newspapers, is offering a new animated video, two original cartoons and a new advertisement that highlight the importance of newspapers.  

The video was contributed by Tank McNamara creator Bill Hinds.  Mike Luckovich, the Pulitzer Prize-winning, nationally syndicated editorial cartoonist for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, has contributed his third original cartoon to The Newspaper Project, and Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott (creators of Baby Blues) have also contributed a panel.

More than 100 newspapers have committed to run the ad beginning this Thursday. All of the new materials are available today in print and online versions, free of charge, at www.newspaperproject.org.  

“Like many industries, newspapers face serious challenges,” Luckovich said.  “But it’s important to remember the millions of Americans who still love and rely on their local newspaper.”

“These talented artists use their unique humor to remind us what we’d be missing without newspapers,” said Randy Siegel, president and publisher of PARADE and a co-founder of The Newspaper Project.  

About The Newspaper Project

The Newspaper Project was launched in 2009 by a small group of newspaper executives who wanted to support a productive exchange of information and ideas about the future of newspapers. On February 2, the newspaperproject.org website was launched along with the first in a series of print and online ads that have been running in more than 400 newspapers across the country.

The original founders of this effort are Randy Siegel, president and publisher of Parade Publications, Donna Barrett, president and CEO of Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc. and president of Southern Newspaper Publishers Association (SNPA), Brian Tierney, CEO and publisher of Philadelphia Media Holdings, and Jay Smith, former president of Cox Newspapers and past chairman of the Newspaper Association of America.