The Swarthmorean, which at 126 years old is among the longest publishing Pennsylvania newspapers, has been sold again, following a change of ownership at the beginning of this year. This time the buyer is Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon and reputedly the richest man in the world. The Swarthmorean joins the Washington Post among Bezos’s newspaper holdings.
Although the private sale price was not reported, former owners Todd Strine and Robert Borgstrom indicated that the price was many multiples of the amounts they paid to acquire the newspaper from Don Delson and Beth Gross at the end of 2018. “Bezos wanted the paper, and he wanted it badly,” Strine said. “Rob and I always said we were never going to get rich owning the Swarthmorean. Turns out we were wrong on that one!”
Strine said Bezos, a college classmate, mentioned at a Princeton alumni event that he was eager to find a medium that reached “real people” rather than the Washington elite.
Rumors that Bezos plans to experiment with drone delivery of the Swarthmorean have not been substantiated.
Related
