At a meeting of the Eastern North Carolina Conference of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, South, in Pittsboro in December
1854, the idea for the publication of a paper as an official
church organ was discussed and adopted. The first issue of the
Raleigh Christian Advocate, as the paper was called, appeared on
4 Jan. 1856. The Advocate was suspended during the Civil War ,
reappearing as the Episcopal Methodist on 16 Jan. 1867, with H.
T. Hudson as managing editor. After several years of leadership
changes at the paper and only sporadic success, church leaders
proposed the merging of the Episcopal Methodist with the Western
Carolina Advocate , the official organ of the Western North
Carolina Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South.
The merger was not finalized until 1919, when church leaders
decided that having one paper would strengthen the bonds of
fraternity and brotherhood between North Carolina's two
Methodist conferences. Under a new charter providing for a joint
publication board to be known a