On a brisk a Wednesday morning, Tom Milligan loads his black jeep with approximately 10,000 papers and sets out on a 6 hour mission to deliver them to four different sections of the city.
One would imagine that most editors do not distribute their papers themselves. However, once editions of The Spirit started to end up in sewers and scattered around the neighborhoods, Milligan decided to take actions into his own hands. Now he distributes the paper himself with a few other workers, recycling the 100-200 leftovers they receive weekly.
The Spirit has been in existence for the past five years and puts out 30,000 papers weekly. Milligan, his wife and his sister in-law do most of the work by themselves and do everything out of there office located on 1428 East Susquehanna Avenue. Interns from Temple, Drexel and University of Penn also handle some of the writing.
Milligan, in between stops at bars, post offices, community centers, dinners said “the community took to the paper because we were able to get our fingers in the dirt of the soil.”
After working for Pepsi for twenty-five years, Milligan a Fishtown native started The Spirit because he saw an open lane due to his papers rival The Star having 88% advertisements in its papers and very little editorial.
The circulation of The Spirit continues to grow and has picked up another section of the city in Bridesburg along with Fishtown, Port Richmond and Kensington which it also covers.
Milligan says the office of the paper has become more then just a place where news is covered it has become a local hang out of sorts and a place where community meetings have been held which is what he dreamed of when he started the paper.
By Jermar Perry and Doanh Nghiem
Group # 7
Port Richmond
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