For many years, most of us who research Northwest Louisiana and Webster Parish history have relied on this quote from Biographical and Historic Memoirs of Northwest Louisiana as the "gold standard" for dating newspaper history in Minden:

"The Minden Iris was the name of a newspaper published at Minden in 1848. This was undoubtedly the first journal issued within the area now embraced in Webster Par., Louisiana but who the publisher was no one can remember, nor would the Iris be mentioned had it not been referred to in one of the old records of Bienville Parish."