The Rogersville Review

Newspaper in Rogersville, Tennessee

The Rogersville Review is a twice weekly newspaper publishing in Rogersville, Tennessee, United States.

The Rogersville Review was founded in 1885 by William T. Robertson. At first, Robertson called his new publication The Holston Review, but he soon changed the name to The Rogersville Review, and the paper has been continuously published under that banner ever since. The Review was the first hot metal newspaper in Tennessee and was also the last such letter press, weekly paper when the conversion to "cold type" was made in July 1981.

The only newspaper which competed with the Review for dominance in the Hawkins County market was The Rogersville Herald. The Herald was published from 1886 to 1932, outliving all other local papers save for the Review. During the 1970s, another newspaper offered competition for the Review. The Hawkins County Free Press was published until 1982, when its subscription list was bought by the publishers of the Review.

Throughout its history The Rogersville Review has undergone numerous changes and countless challenges. Each publisher made a different contribution to the publication and placed their own mark on its pages and in its history.

The most distinguished and perhaps most remembered of all those publishers was Eleanor L. Sheets. In 1932, Major George L. Berry, who owned the newspaper, hired Eleanor and her husband J. Fred Sheets, along with Spurgeon Akers, to run the newspaper. In 1947, the Sheets purchased the paper from Berry. Fred Sheets died in 1958, leaving his widow to run the paper. Eleanor Sheets was a mainstay in Tennessee journalism for six decades. She was a part of the Review for 53 years. She continued to publish the paper until the time of her death, July 18, 1985, in the centenary year of the newspaper.

Her heirs, Lace Hoyt Stevens and W. Andes Hoyt, then began publishing the weekly. In early 1988, The Rogersville Review was sold to the Jones Newspaper Group, headed by Gregg Jones of Greeneville. One month later Doug Morris was named editor and publisher. Morris published the paper until 1990.

In October of that same year, Ellen Addison was named publisher and continued in that role until 1997 when she assumed the helm at the Tri Cities Business Journal. During her tenure at the Review, Addison turned the weekly into a twice weekly newspaper publishing the traditional midweek edition and the new weekend edition. She returned to publish the newspaper in 2006 through 2008.

In April 1997, Kevin L. Burcham moved to Rogersville and took the reins of the newspaper as editor and publisher. The paper then began publishing on the internet. While the paper went on line in 1997, in January 1998, Burcham unveiled a new expanded and updated site, Hawkins County On line. The website features general news information, links to weather, industrial and tourism information, a classified section and obituaries. It is a part of a network of similar sites in the Tri Cities, Greeneville, Morristown, Newport, Lenoir City, Sweetwater, Athens and other communities throughout Northeast Tennessee.