Launched in 1821 by John Edward Taylor, The Guardian (then The Manchester Guardian) is known for being one of the oldest running Sunday papers and its emotionally loaded headlines. The paper caters towards an educated, left-leaning, middle class 18+ audience, with 72% of readers identifying as liberal, in contrast to the 20% mixed and 9% conservative readers. They have always stated that they are left-wing and that they favour the left, but are generally factual. The Guardian was created during a time of worker movements and anti-corn campaigns. It has two sister papers, The Observer and The Guardian Weekly. The Guardian reinvests into journalism instead of distributing profits to owners and shareholders.
Founder John Edward Taylor (11th September 1791 - 6th January 1844) was an editor, publisher and business tycoon. He was an apprentice under a cotton manufacturer and soon became a successful merchant. The Manchester Guardian was found using profit from trading slave grown plantation cotton. Upon Taylor's death, his nephew Charles Prestwich Scott (who was the first editor of the paper) fought to buy the paper, eventually succeeding in 1907. He was a liberal member of parliament and continued editing until 1929.
The Manchester Guardian was a strong opposer of slavery and supported free trade. In 1860, The Observer quoted a report that the recently elected Abraham Lincoln was opposed to the abolition of slavery; however, shortly after the start of the American Civil War, they argued that the North imposed a burdensome trade monopoly on the South, claiming that if the South was freed to have trade with Europe, slavery would eventually cease. The American Civil War brought division between political parties in England. The Manchester Guardian were also split, as they had supported other independence movements, yet felt like they should support the rights of the Confederacy to self-determination.
They criticised President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation for not freeing all American slaves and on October 10th 1862, they wrote "It is impossible to cast any reflections upon a man so evidently sincere and well-intentioned as Mr Lincoln but it is also impossible to not feel that it was an evil day for both America and the world, when he was chosen President of the United States". The newspaper reported the assassination of Lincoln in 1865.
During the 1936-1939 Spanish Civil War, the paper earned a national reputation and respect of the left. George Orwell wrote in the 1938 Homage to Catalonia "Of our larger newspapers, the Manchester Guardian is the only one that leaves me with an increased respect for its honesty". Alongside the pro-liberal News Chronicles, labour supporting Daily Herald, communist party's Daily Worker and many other Sunday and weekly papers, it supported the Republican Government against General Francisco Franco's insurgent nationalists. On August 24th, 1959, the Manchester Guardian changed its name to The Guardian, reflecting the national and international issues published in the paper. It began publication in London in September 1961.
One of the main scoops published by the newspaper was the 2011 international phone-hacking scandal, in particular the hacking of murdered teen Milly Dowler's phone. Another was the 2016 investigation into the Panama Papers, exposing then Prime Minister David Cameron's links to off-shore banking. They have won newspaper of the year four times, the last being in 2014, for reporting on government surveillance.
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