This week – on January 13 to be exact – marks the 10th anniversary of Rye News official listing at Companies House, so it’s a good moment to celebrate Rye’s local newspaper and the local people who set it up. The first edition was published a few months earlier and over the next few weeks we’re going to look back at the paper’s beginnings. To start us off, here’s how Rye News came to be, written by one of the founders, Dennis-Leeds George.
Building the concept of a local newspaper
The idea of a new local newspaper in Rye was raised back in 2012 when Kenneth Bird and I attended a meeting of local volunteers as we were uneasy about the demise in local news. This was followed by a meeting between me and Kenneth on a Wednesday morning over a cup of coffee at the Rye Club. We looked at having a weekly printed local newspaper.
Another motivation for Kenneth was provided by his wife Margaret. She remembered the Rye Gazette published by Mary Owen in the 1980s, an A4 newspaper giving all the weekly news from Rye and the district and printed on a Roneo machine – remember them?. It ceased publication when Mary Owen moved away from Rye.
The next step in producing a newspaper was to recruit people with journalistic experience and people that cared about their community and hopefully would be willing to write about it. We had several meetings around Kenneth’s dining room table with interested volunteers.
We decided to launch a digital newspaper as a printed newspaper of 5,000 copies fortnightly would cost £2,200 monthly. However, not everyone had ready computer access so we were delighted when Adams offered to include six pages in its monthly magazine Fixtures, which has a local circulation of 10,000 copies. Something that continues to this day.
The three next steps to produce Rye News were to set up a not-for-profit community interest company. To do this we were joined by Christopher Strangeways as a Rye News director. Then we needed to appoint a website developer and designer which brought Mark MeGee from Infojuice Ltd on board. Lastly, to fund Rye News we applied to the national lottery award and they granted Rye News £10,000.
Launching a community online newspaper
Rye News had a soft launch, with a presentation in the Rye College hall publicised by posters, banners and flyers plus some invitations. The launch event had good attendance and the new recruits were invited to Kenneth Bird’s house for a drinks and photo shoot by Kt Bruce. Rye News was launched on the internet in May 2014, although it wasn’t until January 2015 that the paper was officially registered as a community interest company (CIC).

The first editor, Tony Nunn, who had many years of journalistic experience, did an excellent job and set the standard very high, which was tough on us volunteers without any journalistic skills.
In the first year of publication the team that had editorial access to Rye News’ dashboard were Britany Rae, Richard Comotto, Charles Harkness, Dee Alsey, Dan Lake, Gillian Roder, John Howlett, John Minter, Seana Lanigan, Tony Mclaughin, Tony Nunn, Kenneth Bird, Nick Taylor, Jane Nunn, Neale East, and Christopher Strangeways: the team that laid down the foundations that Rye News is built on.
The first years of Rye News
Of that team, Charles Harkness, Gillian Roder, Seana Lanigan and Christopher Strangeways, ten years on, are still members of Rye News team. The team of volunteers had a meeting at the Queen Adelaide every Saturday morning to discuss news stories for the coming week and who was or who could, contribute an article. Meeting once a week on Saturday morning and meeting face-to-face also built team spirit.

In the first year, more than 1,000 stories were published by over forty different contributors. Also in the first year, Rye News launched a weekly alert for subscribers. The achievements of that first year has stood Rye News in good stead for ten years.
The following years
Published on Thursday every week and free to view, this is due to community grants (Awards for All, Neighbourhood Enablers, Hastings Trust, Little Cheyne Court Wind Farm – which is administered by Sussex Community Foundation and Kent Community Foundation) and the very welcome donations we receive from our readers. Your support is very much appreciated.

In ten years, Rye News has had five editors: Tony Nunn, Charles Harkness, John Minter, Chris Lawson, Nick Forman and James Stewart. Of the volunteering jobs, being the editor is the most challenging and time-consuming task.
Another challenging job is moderating the comments which is carried out by Christopher Strangeways. Mark MeGee had a career change and a volunteer stepped in to manage and develop the website for the last eight years. Two team members who are long standing volunteers are Mags Ivatts and Heidi Foster. Over ten years, volunteers past and present have done an amazing job sourcing information and stories with a sense of community.
During the pandemic, the team met using Zoom on a Saturday morning which meant Rye News did not miss a single edition helping to keep the community informed in difficult times.
Rye News legacy
Rye News is a powerful tool and, unlike social media, is a platform for the community to talk to one another in an informative and polite way.
If you would like the opportunity to engage with the community, why not become a Rye News volunteer? With volunteers running and helping to run many community assets (the swimming pool and leisure centre, the hospital and hub on the hill, the sport grounds, the food bank, the community garden and many local charities) Rye News has become a volunteers’ hub.
Being a Rye News volunteer for ten years has been educational and challenging, but it has also been very rewarding. I’ve met a cross-section of our community, made new friends and it’s been a lot of fun.
You can contact Rye News by emailing info@ryenews.org.uk.
Image Credits: Natasha Robinson , Rye News , Kt bruce , Rye News library , Martin Bruce , Peter Connock .
Many congratulations to the team at Rye News on your tenth anniversary.
Rye News is an essential weekly read, thank you all for producing it!
As one of the Rye News originals it’s so nice to see Rye News thriving under a great team led by James Stewart
We are so lucky to have The Rye News pop into our in box on a Friday updating us with local news and up coming events! Thank you to all the team both past and present who make it happen.
its a great paper – keeps us informed of local developments – the opinions are always worth a read!