bought the st louis dispatch and combine it with the st louis post in 1878
St. Louis Post-Dispatch In 1878, Joseph Pulitzer purchased the bankrupt St. Louis Dispatch at a public auction[5] and merged it with the St. Louis Evening Post to create the St. Louis Post and Dispatch, whose title was soon shortened to its current form. He appointed John A. Cockerill as the managing editor. Its first edition, 4,020 copies of four pages each, appeared on December 12, 1878.