The Essex County Standard was founded in January 1831, then called the
Essex Standard. It was to be a weekly
Tory paper and "a Standard around which the loyal, the religious, and the well-affected of our County may rally". Managers of the paper dropped the price to 1
d (half a new pence) in 1891, causing a jump in circulation and in 1892, changed the title to
Essex County Standard. A series of changes in editor saw control of the paper ultimately fall into the hands of the Benham family: first Edward, then his wife Mary; next their sons
William and
Charles; and finally William's son
Hervey. In 1964 the paper, then printed by web-offset
lithography (a process pioneered by the Benhams and fellow newspaper proprietor Arnold Quick), was described by
Printing World (a trade paper) as Britain's best produced weekly newspaper. Benham Newspapers Ltd. merged with Quick's
Clacton based publishing company in 1970 to form
Essex County Newspapers Ltd. == References ==