Since 2019, three separate publications have commissioned me to help tell stories on the same theme: the decline of local news. The stories include that of Iowa's oldest newspaper, The Burlington Hawk-Eye (photographed for The Atlantic) and of Iowa's largest newspaper, The Des Moines Register (photographed for POLITICO), both of which are owned by a hedge fund that is dismantling newsrooms across the country.
The third is the story of a smaller chain of newspapers that has proved more resilient. While Iowa's larger media entities depend heavily on the revenue generated during caucus season and may shutter at the prospect of Iowa losing its first-in-the-nation designation, the smallest papers may be most well-positioned to endure a post-caucus future, as they provide an important social glue that is effective, and even profitable, in smaller, rural communities, regardless of politics.
