The Western Morning News is a daily regional newspaper founded in 1860, and covering the Westcountry including Devon, Cornwall, Isles of Scilly and parts of Somerset and Dorset in the South West of England. The Western Morning News was founded by William Saunders and Edward Spender, father of Sir Wilfrid Spender, on 3 January 1860. It has been published continuously since the first edition, including throughout the 1926 General Strike and the Plymouth Blitz. By 1920, the Devon newspaper market was getting cramped, with all papers running into financial difficulties. In the same year, Sir Leicester Harmsworth acquired the Western Morning News; from 1 February 1921, the Western Daily Mercury and Western Evening Herald were also taken over, with the papers continuing to be published from the old Mercury offices in Frankfort Street. Shortly before World War II, new offices were constructed on the same site after the demolition of the previous premises; the modern construction allowed the offices to survive the Blitz and publishing continued there until the move to Derriford.