Predecessor publications The Baptist Advocate was founded in
New York City by a group of Baptists. It first published an issue on May 11, 1839. William H. Wyckoff edited the paper, which purchased the
Gospel Witness six months later. Although with that purchase the
Advocate had eliminated all competition, it was financially unsuccessful and the owners were forced to sell to James L. Thompson and a Mr. Wyckoff in 1842. S. S. Cutting edited the paper from 1844. The
Advocate changed its name to
The New York Recorder before it was sold to Lewis Colby and Joseph Ballard. Colby and Ballard in turn sold the paper to the educator
Martin Brewer Anderson and James S. Dickerson in February 1850. Anderson sold the paper when he became president of the
University of Rochester three years later, to L. F. Beecher. Ownership later passed to
Andrew Ten Brook, who renamed the paper
The New York Recorder and Register, absorbing
The New York Baptist which had been formed in 1823 in
Utica, New York.
The New York Chronicle was established either in 1840 or in 1849 by O. B. Judd as a monthly paper.
Shortly the next year it switched to a weekly format. It was purchased about three years later by J. S. Backus and by 1856 Pharcellus Church had bought the paper from Backus. Church combined the
Chronicle with Philadelphia's
Christian Chronicle in 1863''.
The New York Times profiled the paper in 1880 as "A Vigorous Baptist Paper", praising the efforts of Bright and describing it as "the organ" of the Baptists, noting that "it is wielded for good in every community where a Baptist church is to be found." Contributors to the paper included
Francis Wayland, the president of
Brown University. In 1883 the paper was described as having "the largest circulation of any Baptist newspaper in the world." Bright died in 1894 and the paper continued to expand, purchasing
The National Baptist that year, at which point
H. L. Wayland joined its staff, In 1919 it was described as having been "the foremost force in American Baptist journalism." == References ==