Ken Shortt
Ken Shortt started a weekly Yukon newspaper in 1960 in competition to the [Whitehorse] Star. The new paper began as the weekly Advertiser and was quickly renamed the Yukon News. Shortt had a full time job so the paper was put together in his spare time. In 1965, Shortt expanded the paper to a daily through a partnership with Dave Robertson who volunteered his time in order to learn the business. The partnership broke down after a year or so and Shortt found that trying to produce the Yukon Daily News by himself was too much so the paper went back to being a weekly in the late 1960s. By that time, Shortt was running the paper, a printing company, and a monthly magazine.1)
Shortt sold the newspaper to a group of businessmen but their skills were not up to the task and Shortt was compelled to buy the newspaper back. He built the readership back up and after a couple of years Dave Robertson bought the paper [in 1970]. By 1986, the Yukon News circulation surpassed the Star’s and was making a good and regular profit. In 1989, Robertson sold the paper to his son Steven who went on to lead the paper into awards for design and journalism.2)