SeacoastNH.com Presents  
Historic Portsmouth #377

This picture, taken on the steps of the Rockingham Hotel on State Street shows some of the 100 reporters who covered the Treaty of Portsmouth in 1905. This was a major media event. Writers from across the globe covered the month-long negotiations between Japanese and Russian representatives that ended the bloody territorial war. Their daily updates went out on the new transatlantic cable that linked seacoast NH to the planet. (Continued below)

President Teddy Roosevelt won the Nobel Prize for initiating the talks. It was Portsmouth’s finest hour and, smack in the middle of it all was Fernando W. Hartford, editor and publisher of the Portsmouth Herald. Look closely at the center of the photograph and you will see him. Hartford is the focus of my latest special feature in the Portsmouth Herald. Hartford was the first editor and yes, he’s the one in the middle (first row, see insert) holding the dog (or cat) and wearing weird socks. “FW” started the Herald with a loan from millionaire ale-maker Frank Jones. Hartford was also mayor of this city seven times. But here comes the interesting part – no one knows exactly when the first issue of the city’s only daily newspaper came out. Read all about it in the September 23, 2011 Portsmouth Herald – and on this site, of course.  (Photo courtesy of the Portsmouth Athenaeum)

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