My Genealogy Hound

WILLIAM H. P. DENNY, editor of the Georgetown Gazette, was born in Chillicothe, Ohio, June 3, 1811, and was the son of George and Sarah (Higgins) Denny. His father, George Denny, one of the first printers and editors of Ohio, emigrated from Pittsburgh to Cincinnati before the close of last century, and worked as a printer on the Centinel of the Northwest Territory, the first newspaper printed at Cincinnati, afterward on the Western Star, at Lebanon, for Judge John McLean, and later, was editor and publisher of the Scioto Gazette, at Chillicothe, from 1806 to 1816. George Denny and his wife both died on the same night at Wilmington, Ohio, in 1823. Young William, when only nine years of age, commenced learning the art of printing in the office of the Ohio Interior Gazette, published at Xenia by Kendall & Denny. In 1821, he removed with his father to Wilmington, and set type on the Galaxy until the death of his father, when the paper passed into the hands of Hon. J. N. Reynolds, with whom he worked for a short time. In the winter of 1824, he was an apprentice to Cameron & Sellers, in the publication of the Western Star, at Lebanon. Subsequently, he worked as a printer at Xenia, and at Cincinnati, on the Crisis and Emporium, at Columbus on the State Journal, and again at Cincinnati on the Liberty Hall and Cincinnati Gazette. In 1829, then in his eighteenth year, he commenced at Wilmington the Clintonian, which he continued until 1831, when he sold out to John Crichfield, and removed to Louisville, Ky., and became foreman for George D. Prentice, of the Louisville Journal. He remained in that city until 1834. In 1835, in partnership with Jacob Morris, he published the Western Star at Lebanon. For twenty-six years he was connected with the Star as apprentice, editor and publisher. From 1846 until 1858, he was the sole publisher of that paper. From 1858 until 1861, he published the Dayton Daily and Weekly Gazette. In 1861, he started the Circleville Union, which he published for six years. In 1871, he purchased the Wilmington Journal, and continued it until 1878, when he returned to Lebanon and started the Lebanon Gazette, which he disposed of, and in 1880, established the Georgetown Gazette, which he still publishes. While a resident of Warren County, he represented Warren and Greene Counties in the Ohio Senate in the years 1841-42 and 1843-44. In 1856, he was a Presidential Elector on the Fremont ticket, and was Postmaster at Circleville from 1865 to 1872. In politics, he has been an Anti-slavery Whig and a Republican. Mr. Denny is probably the oldest newspaper man in the State of Ohio, having been engaged in the printing business, with but brief intervals, for sixty-two years, and as an editor for more than fifty years.