About Husumer Nachrichten

Husumer Nachrichten

The Husumer Nachrichten are a German daily newspaper published in Husum, Schleswig-Holstein. Founded in 1873, the paper is the regional newspaper for Husum and the southern part of the Nordfriesland district, with a publishing history of more than 150 years. The paper belongs to the Schleswig-Holsteinischer Zeitungsverlag (sh:z) of Flensburg, which it joined in 1970, and appears Monday through Saturday. The sh:z, with 22 daily newspapers, is the largest daily publisher in Schleswig-Holstein, reaching a circulation of more than 150,000 copies and around half a million readers. The paper's digital home is the sh:z news portal at shz.de.

Overview

The Husumer Nachrichten are published six days a week as a subscription daily in the sh:z group. Their distribution area is Husum, the district town of Nordfriesland on the North Sea known as the "grey town by the sea" of Theodor Storm, and the southern part of the Nordfriesland district with the Eiderstedt peninsula, the Halligen and the North Frisian islands. The paper is regarded by many North Frisians as a reliable source of information and a piece of home, reflecting the region's history, culture and traditions in its daily reporting; in remote villages and on the islands and Halligen it holds a particularly high standing as the medium that connects land and people.

The sh:z group's portfolio includes the Flensburger Tageblatt, the Schleswig-Holsteinische Landeszeitung, the Norddeutsche Rundschau, the Holsteinischer Courier, the Eckernförder Zeitung and the Nordfriesland Tageblatt for Niebüll, among others. The Husumer Nachrichten and the Nordfriesland Tageblatt together cover the Nordfriesland district. The Danish daily Flensborg Avis maintains its own local editorial office in Husum, serving the Danish minority.

The audience of the Husumer Nachrichten is the population of Husum and southern Nordfriesland: households that value a daily paper deeply rooted in North Frisian identity, with a loyalty built over generations in a coastal landscape defined by the sea, the dikes and the Frisian language and customs. The paper's 150-year history in the "grey town by the sea" of Theodor Storm connects it to one of Germany's most literary landscapes, and its coverage of the Halligen, the tiny islands that flood at high tide, reaches communities that few other media serve.

History

The Husumer Nachrichten were founded in 1873 as a newspaper for Husum, then a growing harbour town in the Prussian province of Schleswig-Holstein. Across more than 150 years they accompanied the town through the German Empire, two world wars and the post-war period, developing into the established home paper of the North Frisians. A book published in 2023 on the paper's history describes the editorial work, the production process and the elaborate logistics of its distribution, with the focus on the deliverers and the readers for whom the paper is made.

A defining figure in the paper's modern history was Helmut Sethe, who joined the Husumer Nachrichten in 1962 and was given the editorship in 1963, making him temporarily the youngest editor-in-chief in Germany. Sethe shaped the paper into a publication with its own liberal and independent profile, and his honorary commitment to press freedom, European integration and international understanding was honoured with the Federal Cross of Merit. He supported German-Danish cooperation and, on the basis of the EKD's Eastern memorandum, actively worked for reconciliation with Poland.

In 1970 the Husumer Nachrichten joined the Schleswig-Holsteinischer Zeitungsverlag, the Flensburg-based newspaper group. The integration preserved the paper's title and local identity while connecting its production to the group's shared services. The sh:z is a wholly owned subsidiary of the medien holding:nord GmbH in Flensburg; in 2016 the NOZ Medien group took over medien holding:nord, with the Federal Cartel Office approving the merger.

Coverage and Content

The local section of the Husumer Nachrichten covers Husum and southern Nordfriesland. Regular topics include the town council and the district administration, the harbour town's urban development, the North Sea coast with its tourism, the Eiderstedt peninsula and the Halligen, the regional economy with the wind energy industry, agriculture and the harbour, the North Frisian language and customs, schools and education, health care, the police blotter, club and association life, church news, culture and events with the Theodor Storm heritage, and local sport. The sea, the dikes and the Frisian identity give the paper's community reporting a distinctive local colour.

The sh:z group's regional and national pages cover Schleswig-Holstein state politics, German federal politics, international news, the economy, culture and sport. The group's news portal shz.de carries the stories of all 22 daily newspapers, creating a digital network that mirrors the print group's structure. Weekend editions carry expanded magazine content. The division between the centrally produced sections and the locally produced pages gives readers a complete daily newspaper: the breadth of a large regional newsroom combined with the proximity of journalists who work in Husum itself.

Advertising in the Husumer Nachrichten reaches households in Husum and southern Nordfriesland precisely, making the paper an important medium for local retailers, craftsmen, service providers, the real-estate market and job advertisements. The sh:z group's free paper WochenSchau, with a Nordfriesland edition, is distributed weekly in Husum.

Organization and Ownership

The Husumer Nachrichten are published by the Schleswig-Holsteinischer Zeitungsverlag GmbH & Co. KG in Flensburg, which they joined in 1970. The sh:z is a wholly owned subsidiary of the medien holding:nord GmbH in Flensburg, taken over by the NOZ Medien group in 2016. The managing directors are Stefan Berthold, Jens Wegmann and Paul Wehberg; the publishers are Werner F. Ebke and Jan Dirk Elstermann; the editors-in-chief include Gerrit Bastian Mathiesen and Jan Schönstedt.

The paper is printed in the group's production facilities and distributed to subscribers each morning from Monday to Saturday across Husum and southern Nordfriesland. The subscription model dominates sales. The edition operates within the group's shared services for printing, distribution, digital publishing and advertising sales, while the Husum newsroom retains editorial responsibility for the local pages that define the Husumer Nachrichten's identity.

Digital Presence

The digital home of the Husumer Nachrichten is the sh:z news portal at shz.de, which carries news stories from all of the group's newspapers. Readers can follow reporting from Husum on the website, in the group's news app and through the e-paper edition, which reproduces the printed paper page for page for reading on tablets, smartphones and computers.

The portal operates on the paid-content model: full article texts are generally reserved for subscribers, while headlines and teasers are visible to all visitors. On social media, the sh:z channels distribute headlines from across Schleswig-Holstein, including Husum stories, and provide a point of contact between the newsroom and its readers. For the Husumer Nachrichten, digital channels serve readers within the distribution area who prefer to read on their phones as well as former residents who have moved away from Nordfriesland but want to stay informed about their home region. The printed paper remains the core product, carrying forward a publishing tradition that began in 1873 in the harbour town on the North Sea. The Husumer Nachrichten's standing in the remote villages, on the islands and on the Halligen, where it is often the only daily medium connecting the community to the wider world, underlines the continuing social function of the local newspaper in the coastal region.