Crosby Stuart Noyes (February 16, 1825 – February 21, 1908) was the publisher of the Washington Evening Star.
Biography
Noyes was born on February 16, 1825, in Minot, Maine.[1] Interested in writing from childhood, he published a juvenile newspaper called the Minot Notion when he was fifteen. Later, Maine newspapers began to publish his humorous sketches. One such sketch, a dialect-heavy piece titled "A Yankee in a Cotton Factory" was widely republished.[2]
Having arranged to write letters from Washington, D.C., for several New England newspapers, he set out for the nation's capital in 1847. In Baltimore, his funds ran too low to afford onward train fare, so he walked the rest of the way to Washington.[3] In D.C., he worked for a bookseller, as an usher in a theatre, and as a route agent for The Baltimore Sun before becoming a writer for a local weekly, the Washington News. He also added newspapers in Philadelphia as a client for his letter dispatches, and became part of the press gallery that covered the United States Congress.[3]
In 1855, he traveled around Europe on foot, contributing letters to the Boston Transcript. He returned to Washington later that year and became a reporter for the Evening Star,[4] a three-year-old newspaper managed by William Douglas Wallach.
Circulation increased in the decade before the American Civil War and Noyes developed contacts with the Lincoln administration's cabinet such that the Star became an outlet for official announcements. He eventually rose to the position of assistant editor. In 1863, he served on the Washington, D.C., city council and for a couple of terms as an alderman.
In 1867, he and two other investors purchased the Star from Wallach for $110,000[5] ($2,400,000 today[6]). Appointing himself editor-in-chief, Noyes used his newspaper to crusade to improve Washington's buildings and infrastructure, encouraging the efforts of Alexander Robey Shepherd.[3] He was active in the establishment of Rock Creek Park.[7]
In 1893, Noyes and Brainard Warner, an early developer of Kensington, Maryland, built and stocked what became the first public library in the D.C. area, now known as the Noyes Children's Library in Kensington.[8]
He married Elizabeth S. Williams in 1856. They had three sons, Theodore Williams, Frank Brett, and Thomas Clarence; and at least one daughter.[3] Theodore was an associate editor at the Evening Star and Frank was the treasurer and business manager.[5]
Legacy
Crosby S. Noyes Education Campus, a public school in Washington, D.C., was named in his honor. Two residential streets — Noyes Drive and Crosby Road — carry his name in the Woodside Park neighborhood of Silver Spring, Maryland. The entire neighborhood was developed from his country estate, known as Alton Farm.[11]Mount Noyes in Washington state is named in his honor.[12]
^Noyes, Crosby S (November 4, 1847). "A Yankee in a Cotton Factory". Commercial Advertiser. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved March 23, 2013.
^ abcdProctor, John Clagett (1932). Washington Past and Present. New York: Lewis Historical Pub. Co. pp. 890–894.
^"Crosby S. Noyes editor of the Washington Star, died late this afternoon". Dallas Morning News. February 22, 1908. Retrieved December 14, 2008. Crosby Stewart Noyes, whose death was reported today from Pasadena, Cal., was 83 years of age, and no less than sixty years of his manhood had been spent in the newspaper business. He was born in Minot, Maine, Feb. 16, 1825, and, finding farm life too hard for his frail physique, he came to Washington in 1847, making the last stages of his journey on foot for lack of funds. He began his newspaper work in the following year as a special correspondent and a writer for the Washington News. From that date until a week preceding his death Mr. Noyes labored unceasingly at his chosen profession, and set a high example upon Washington journalism as a purveyor of clean, sound, active facts.[dead link]
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