On Feb. 22, 1867, about a half dozen students gathered to form a student newspaper at IU. Out of that meeting came the Indiana Student and what is now the Indiana Daily Student.
When it began, the Student published only twice a month. However, in 1874, the newspaper stopped publishing because of financial problems. It was reinstated eight years later by William Julian Bryan, who later became William Lowe Bryan and IU’s 10th president.
In 1911, the School of Journalism was formed. That same year the school required every journalism student to work on the paper. Students received course credit and a grade for their work.
A turning point for the IDS came in 1969. The newspaper adopted its charter on July 1, making it financially and editorially independent from IU. Students fought for the paper’s independence for over a year before the IU board of trustees accepted the charter. Because of the paper’s new-found independence, journalism students were no longer required to work at the paper.
For a while, the IDS was a paid-circulation newspaper and was a quarter each until the fall of 1995. At that time it was one of only two college newspapers in the country that still charged a fee. That fall, the IDS went to free, mass circulation. Since then the newspaper has been completely dependent on advertising revenue, receiving no money from the University or student fees.
