Introducing the Knoxville Mercury

In Cover Stories, News by Coury Turczynleave a COMMENT

The Knoxville Mercury is an independent weekly news magazine devoted to informing and connecting Knoxville’s many different communities. And it exists due to an outpouring of financial and personal support from Knoxvillians of varied backgrounds. Here’s our story.

WELCOME TO OUR STARTOVER, AN EDITOR’S NOTE
To be honest, I was actually looking forward to taking a vacation. But idle repose was not on the immediate agenda. That’s because Knoxville wouldn’t take no for an answer.

WHAT IS THE KNOXVILLE MERCURY? 
While the past several months have been a complicated fact-finding mission, we believe the model we finally landed on may be Knoxville’s best chance for a community-funded, locally owned, editorially independent journalistic endeavor: a taxable not-for-profit paper governed by a nonprofit organization, both devoted to educating the public about Knoxville.

COALITION OF THE WILLING: KNOXVILLIANS WHO PITCHED IN
Here are just some of the people who volunteered in their time, effort, and expertise in this community effort to start a new weekly paper for Knoxville.

CAN DAILIES AND WEEKLIES SURVIVE THE DIGITAL AGE?
You’d have to be crazy to start a new print newspaper—much less an alternative weekly. Nobody’s doing it. On the contrary, alt-weeklies with long, rich histories are shutting down.

THE KNOXVILLE HISTORY PROJECT 
A key part of the Mercury launch is the formation of a new 501(c)(3) nonprofit, an educational organization known as the Knoxville History Project. Director Jack Neely shares its mission and its relationship to the paper. Plus: KHP’s board of directors.

MEET THE KNOXVILLE MERCURY’S COLUMNISTS
Here’s our inaugural group of columnists whose work will be debuting in the next several issues of the Knoxville Mercury.

Editor Coury Turczyn guided Knoxville's alt weekly, Metro Pulse, through two eras, first as managing editor (and later executive editor) from 1992 to 2000, then as editor-in-chief from 2007 to 2014. He's also worked as a Web editor at CNET, the erstwhile G4 cable network, and HGTV.

Share this Post