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The Stranger (newspaper)

alternative weekly newspaper in Seattle

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 7, 2026
Entity authorityQ3522886 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Stranger is an alternative news and commentary publication in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1991 by Tim Keck and cartoonist James Sturm, it has a progressive orientation. The paper's principal competitor was the Seattle Weekly until 2019 when the Weekly ceased print publication. Originally published weekly, The Stranger became biweekly in 2017 and suspended print publication during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, resuming publication of a quarterly arts magazine in March 2023 and further increasing its print issues in 2025. It also publishes online content and political endorsements for liberal or progressive candidates.

History

The Stranger was founded in July 1991 by Tim Keck, who had previously co-founded the satirical newspaper The Onion, and cartoonist James Sturm. Its first issue was produced out of a home in Seattle's Wallingford neighborhood and was released on September 23, 1991. The newspaper's title reflected the fact that Keck had almost no connection to Seattle prior to launching the paper. In 1993, The Stranger relocated to Seattle's Capitol Hill district, where its offices remained until 2020. The Stranger's tagline is "Seattle's Only Newspaper" (a characterization alluding to its local ownership).

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “The Stranger (newspaper)” is alternative weekly newspaper in Seattle. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Stranger, newspaper and alternative, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1991, 2019, 2017, 2020—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1991. For this dossier, Stranger, newspaper and alternative is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “alternative weekly newspaper in Seattle” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3522886. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1991, 2019, 2017 and 2020.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “The Stranger (newspaper)”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow The Stranger (newspaper) primary sources, The Stranger (newspaper) archive and Stranger research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “The Stranger (newspaper)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.