History
Three alternative weekly advertising representatives formed their own company in 1979, publishing the Brookline Tab and Newton Tab as advertising-heavy community papers. Two years later, prompted by the closure of The Real Paper, the company expanded into Boston and Cambridge.
At first, CEO Russel Pergament acknowledged that the papers gave softball coverage to some political topics, but said his papers were happy to "live on crumbs from The Globe's table" -- to report the local news the big-city daily was missing. He said in 1981 that "we find that the people who live in Brookline and Newton know their local politics better than ever now, largely due to us."
Later that year, however, observers had kudos for the Cambridge Tab, citing its eye-catching headlines and devotion to issue-based journalism as separating it from the 137-year-old Cambridge Chronicle. One reader said he preferred the Tab because "I want to know what's going on behind the scenes in politics. I'm not so interested in who was born or who died or what's on the school lunch menu."
Read more about this topic: Tab Communications
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