Beachcombing for Words
In 1955, Margaret Buchholz began beachcombing for words when she became Long Beach Island, NJ’s first female newspaper publisher and editor of a small summer weekly called The Beachcomber.
“When I first started doing this there was no other woman on the island who was an editor and publisher,” Buchholz said. “Unlike that other woman in Washington DC (Katherine Graham) who ran The Washington Post, I was the editor and publisher of a very small, local island newspaper. My world was Long Beach Island, NJ.”
Buchholz set foot in the editorial office during the 50s when journalism was still considered a gentleman’s career. Newsrooms were labor pools a woman didn’t often dip her toes into.
“The public here on LBI shared that opinion,” Buchholz said. “As the publisher and editor, I also sometimes delivered the newspapers. I was dropping the papers off in front of Kapler’s Pharmacy. I was driving an old station wagon, and I plopped a whole bunch of about one hundred newspapers down in front of the store. It hadn’t opened yet and there were all these men sitting around waiting for it to open and get their newspapers. One of them turned to the other and said what a cheap outfit to hire a girl to do a man’s work.”
Owning and editing her own newspaper was never a lifelong dream or a goal for Buchholz.
“Growing up I had no goals.” Buchholz said. “I wanted to be a modern dancer and then I wanted to be an archaeologist. I took over the paper because my husband died. But I ended up running The Beachcomber for 32 years and I loved it.”
Buchholz got her start at The Beachcomber for two summers during college selling advertising and delivering newspapers. “My mother was involved writing gardening and food columns and she said get a summer job at The Beachcomber and ask for $50 a week. That’s what I did and that’s what I got.”
The Beachcomber was originally started in 1950 by Donald Craig, a publicist from North Jersey.
In March 1955 Buchholz married Bill Douglas the editor of the Beach Haven Times. They bought the paper for $6,000. After the passing of her husband Buchholz took the helm of The Beachcomber and became its publisher and editor.
As The Beachcomber’s readership grew so did the paper. Buchholz’s hard work turned a publication that was basically an advertising vehicle into a feature format newspaper. She ran it until the mid-1980s at which point she sold it to The SandPaper.
Buchholz takes a matter-of-fact attitude when asked to describe how it felt to have been the first and only woman to own and run a newspaper on Long Beach Island, NJ.
“I was brought up to believe I would always work for a living,” she said. “I was nothing special. Women in journalism today are running all over the world getting stories. My world back then was Long Beach Island, NJ. I was the publisher and editor of a very small, local newspaper. There isn’t any need today for something like The Beachcomber.”
Learn more about The Beachcomber as Niche News
Contact Information
Margaret Buchholz
Images courtesy of Margaret Buchholz