Lawson's family grew rich from real estate dealings in Chicago, and held stakes in a Norwegian-language newspaper called the
Skandinaven. was a tenant in the same building as the
Skandinaven. The
Daily News was struggling, but Victor Lawson decided to invest in it in July 1876, becoming its manager. Within twenty years, its circulation grew to 200,000 people. Lawson mainly focused on the business aspects of the paper, while Stone and others worked as editors. Helping to fuel the paper's success was Lawson's ability to attract advertisers. Lawson provided clear circulation figures to businesses and promised consistent rates for advertisements. by
Lorado Taft marks Lawson's grave The
Daily News employed
Eugene Field, one of the first major newspaper columnists, and contained a mix of fiction, household advice, and reports on city happenings. David Paul Nord writes, "It was quintessentially an urban newspaper, committed to private business but also to activist government, to social welfare, and to the broad public life of the city. It was a progenitor of the kind of progressive reform politics that came to flower in many cities during the early twentieth century." In 1898, Lawson founded an early foreign news service, which became a key component of the
Daily News. {{cite web ==Honor==