October 31, 1986

The Gannett Corporation, owner of USA Today and several other newspapers, purchased the Arkansas Gazette. Gannett brought in a steady stream of company executives who tried to revamp the Gazette with color photographs, jazzier stories, and more emphasis on soft news and features. Readers took umbrage at many of the changes, and Walter Hussman and his Democrat used their advantage of being the locally owned product, although such innovations as color photography had been a staple of the Democrat for some time. Gannett eventually sold the Gazette to Hussman, and, on October 19, 1991, the first issue of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette was published.