Reade Brower

Reade Francis Brower is a businessperson who owned most of the newspapers in Maine for nearly a decade in the 21st century. His company, MaineToday Media, was described by The Maine Monitor as a "near-monopoly".^[1] As of 2025, he owns three newspapers: The Ellsworth American (Ellsworth), The Mount Desert Islander (Bar Harbor), and the Midcoast Villager.

Reade Brower
Born	1956 or 1957 (age 68–69)
Spouse	Martha Brower ​ (m. 1985)​

Personal life

Brower grew up in Westborough, Massachusetts, with his adoptive parents Carmel and Richard. He attended the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and graduated in 1978 with a degree in marketing. As of 2018, he is married to Martha McSweeney Brower (née Martha McSweeney). They were married in 1985.^[2]

Career

Before owning newspapers, Brower was an entrepreneur who started several companies, including an auto catalog and direct-mail company that advertised to 600,000 Maine households each week.^[3] In 1985, he founded The Free Press.^[4] In 2015, Brower bought MaineToday Media from financier S. Donald Sussman.^[5] He continued purchasing Maine newspapers;^[a] in 2017, he owned 24 papers in Maine, including four of the state's seven daily newspapers.^[6] In 2018, he had acquired six of the seven daily papers in the state, the exception being the Bangor Daily News).^[7]

On March 30, 2023, he announced he was looking to sell or take on investors to Masthead Maine, the successor to MaineToday.^[8] On March 31, Bangor Daily News reported that he owned five dailies and 25 weeklies, and six specialty publications.^[9] He was 66 at the time.^[10] On July 10, 2023, Bangor Daily News reported that Brower had sold the five daily newspapers and 17 weeklies he owned to the nonprofit National Trust for Local News.^[11]

MaineStay Media

He owns six weeklies that he did not sell in 2023: The Ellsworth American (Ellsworth), The Mount Desert Islander (Bar Harbor), The Courier-Gazette (Rockland), The Republican Journal (Belfast), The Camden Herald (Camden), and The Free Press (Camden).^[12][13] Those six papers had united under the company MaineStay Media in 2022.^[14] Four of those newspapers (The Courier-Gazette, The Republican Journal, The Camden Herald and The Free Press) were combined in 2024 to form the Midcoast Villager.^[4]

Notes

1. See MaineToday Media § Brower for an outline of some acquisitions.