Financial History Issue 122 (Summer 2017) | Page 26

John J. Kiernan Business Journalism Pioneer, 1845–1893 By Rob Wells John J. Kiernan was a little-known but key transitional figure in business journal- ism in the 19th century, a journalist and business owner who operated at the dawn of electric news dissemination. Kiernan and his Wall Street Financial News Bureau are best known for training three younger reporters — Charles Dow, Edward Jones and Edward Bergstresser — right before they launched the Dow Jones News Ser- vice and then The Wall Street Journal. Kiernan, however, deserves more than a footnote in the Dow Jones company histo- ries. Several accounts identified Kiernan’s operation as the leading financial news agency on Wall Street in the two decades following the end of the Civil War. A focus on Kiernan’s business deal- ings shows the entrepreneurial energy and evolution of early business journalism, a dynamic post-Civil War era where signifi- cant changes in technology, the economy and markets were creating a new demand for business news. In this period of disrup- tive technology — the expansion of the telegraph — Kiernan adapted by using a combination of messenger boys and ticker tape machines to serve Gilded Age clients such as JP Morgan and Jay Gould. Kiernan thrived through this blend of physical news gathering and electric-powered news distribution to serve stockbrokers and the market, his core audience. Kiernan’s office was also a social gathering spot for a grow- ing corps of financial journalists who were beginning to form an identity and separate genre in this era. Kiernan was a popular Wall Street fig- ure who transitioned from finance to poli- tics, a move that led to his downfall as he lost focus and later control of his news agency. Kiernan was elected to the New York State Senate in 1881 and was men- tioned as a possible mayor of Brooklyn. Yet during his time in Albany, Kiernan’s business began to unravel, and he was surpassed by Dow Jones and the reporters he once trained. Business Journalism History Kiernan’s Wall Street Financial News Bureau 1 fit comfortably within the notion that business journalism enjoyed a 24    FINANCIAL HISTORY  |  Summer 2017  | www.MoAF.org symbiotic relationship with the markets and was partly a servant to business. His news agency began in 1869, about 30 years into the growth of modern business jour- nalism, a genre that evolved with the new industrial society and a related demand for advertising. Specialized commercial publications expanded significantly after the Civil War to meet a demand from industrial firms and brokers. Historian Frank Luther Mott described the late 19th century as the rise of the independent press, a period when more than 9,000 periodicals launched. Prior to Kiernan, significant business journal- ism included The Economist in 1843 and William Buck Dana’s Commercial and Financial Chronicle in 1861, as well as trade publications such as the American Railroad Journal, founded in 1826, which historian Alfred Chandler called “one of the most influential business journals of the day.” John J. Kiernan, a fixture on Wall Street and the financial news business in the late 19th century.