THE HERALD RETURNS
“The Mona's Herald was recreated once again, as part of this week’s Isle of Man Heritage Festival, held at the Sea Tenninal 18th•21st October. 1990.
A front page, complete with authentic masthead from a 1890 edition of the historic Isle of Man paper, was put together by students from St.Ninian's High School. It contained stories and adverts old and new.
The very latest technology was used to produce the paper, including Apple Macintosh computers borrowed from the St.Ninian's High School Information Technology Department,.
In charge of production was teacher Alex Townsend, ably assisted by sixth form student Andrew Nicks. Andrew was principally involved in creating the new paper's masthead, which was scanned into the computer using a high resolution scanner. Because the original image used was so poor, Andrew had to use special computer techniques to "clean up" the image before it could be used.
Said Andrew: "It was fascinating to see the clean sharp image emerging from the poor photocopy we originally had to work with. It was painstaking work, but I think the finished product was worth all the effort and eye strain.”
According to Alex. Townsend, head of Information Technology at St.Ninian's High School, the 1990 version is quite different from the original.
“For a start, our paper has news on the front page. The original Mona's Herald, in common with other papers of the era, featured only advertisements on its cover.
"We were also able to include a "news" photograph, something which would have been very rare back in the 1890s, when most photographs or "blocks" were prepared in advance for use in advertisements only.
The picture and the story which goes with it, were in fact brought to the Heritage Exhibition by David North MHK. It features himself and the late Mona Douglas, along with visiting Celtic Musicians who took pan in a two-day music festival back in 1950.
Andrew Nicks was again responsible for "cleaning up" both the faded picture and text, for inclusion on the cover of the "Mona's Herald".
Said Alex Townsend, "It was a fascinating exercise, trying to recreate the style and appearance of the old letterpress newspaper, but using present day typefaces, and computerised Desk Top Publishing Technology.
"Another interesting feature is the way that some of today's top news stories from the Island's local papers, look equally at home on the from page of an 1890 paper. It's difficult to spot the original Mona's Herald material from the new material.
"Things don't change that much!"
St.Ninian's High School became involved in the exhibition, to provide "A Classroom of the 1990s", a contrast to the highly popular "1890s" classroom next door.
In contrast to the computers and laser printers of today's classroom, the old classroom featured a suitably capped and gowned "teacher", wielding a cane, and shouting at "pupils" as they recited mathematical tables and spelling in unison.
The delightfully authentic 1890s classroom, featured suitably dismal green paintwork, and period desks and chairs from the Department of Education archive collection. A handbell was used to summon pupils to "lessons", which took place throughout the four day Exhibition.
On leaving the 1890s classroom, visitors could contrast the "chalk and talk" with the students busily working at today's computer terminals, where the "Mona's Herald" was being produced.
