The Nevada County Scooper was founded in 1914 by Fred Bloomfield III, esq. and his wife Vinalla A. Bloomfield. Throughout its 92 year history the Scooper, as its affectionately called by locals, has striven to provide it’s citizens with the most up to date and hard-hitting journalism the area has ever witnessed. As the recipient of many, many awards, the Scooper recently ran out of wall space in i
t’s Penn Valley office after receiving a Gold record from long time supporter and Nevada County Scooper reader Alice Cooper. Early History
In its early days the Nevada County Scooper was published from downtown Grass Valley and was the chief competitor to another, to be unnamed, local newspaper. During this time, the Scooper did not possess a printing press, nor the courage to borrow one. So the Scooper relied solely on shouting at people on the street to circulate the news. Later in the 1930s, the Scooper expanded its shouting service to Nevada City, frequently paying vagrants to assault citizens with news. Mr Bloomfield was a firm believer in enlightened self interest and believed that he was serving both the community and the paper’s interests. Middle History
In 1949, after 17 long years of World War II, the Scooper finally purchased a printing press. However due the untimely death of Mr. Bloomfield’s wife in a bizarre gardening accident, he decided to sell his holdings in the newspaper to the Hearst Corporation for an undisclosed sum. The monies from this transaction were used for various failed housing developments around Nevada County including the infamous “homes over Wolf Creek” project. Fresh History
After over 94 years of Hearst Corporation operation, the company sold the Scooper and its assets to former kid genius Randall “Fink” Finkelstein. Fink immediately set out to build a World Class local newspaper, as he put it, “for the rest of us, in Nevada County. Maybe Sierra County too if I get up there.” His goal of bringing worldly worldliness and his insightful blog commentary to Nevada County is first and foremost. Unless there’s money to be made in Sierra City. Then he will include them as well. The Future
Fink hopes one day to put everyone in a flying car. Lou is hoping to retire to Cedar Ridge.
