Eliel Lanyon Dale

Newspaperman

Eliel Lanyon Dale did more for Carthage than almost anyone else honored on this wall. His parents were English and he was born August 14, 1890 to Mr. and Mrs. Livion Dale in Kendall, Wisconsin. Mrs. Dale’s family, the Lanyons, was in the smelter business and the amount of lead and zinc mining in our area drew them to Kansas to establish smelters in Pittsburg and Iola. E.L.’s first job was as a printer’s devil at the Iola Register newspaper while still in grade school and his pay was $1.00 weekly.

Upon the death of his father, the family moved to Carthage and E.L. attended school here. In Carthage he worked for the Carthage Morning Democrat until he joined the Carthage Press in 1903, starting as a printers devil, then a reporter and finally as Publisher in 1944. Space does not allow all of his honors and awards but a few were: one of the creators of the KOM baseball league, creating the ROTC program in Carthage; he was one of the first state leaders to be placed in the Hall of Honor at Missouri University School of Journalism in Columbia.

He counted among his friends Mickey Mantle and Casey Stengel and he was a friend of Harry Truman, although Dale was a Republican.

He married Julia Stickney on November 5, 1914 and they had a son, Robert S. Dale and a daughter, Carolyn Dale Roberts.

He, along with his son and some outside investors, purchased the Carthage Press and turned it into a great hometown paper. He was known for his generosity and compassion.

He was also one of the news media leaders who were summoned to the White House to confer with John F. Kennedy on problems in the federal government.

He was one of the top people responsible for our Municipal Park, and Myers airport, and he devoted his life to Carthage. It was said of him that he was always for Carthage and its people first. He died in 1969 at the age of 79.