Jesse Yarnell

Who was Jesse Yarnell?

Thomas Jesse Yarnell, known as Jesse Yarnell, was a California newspaperman who established the Los Angeles, California, Weekly Mirror, which took over the Los Angeles Times in 1881 and later merged with it.

Yarnell was born in Gratiot, Ohio, on June 20, 1837, and learned the printing trade in Zanesville in that state. He came to California in 1862 and established the Daily News in Placerville. He and Susan Caystile were married there. Four years later he moved to Los Angeles, where he founded the Weekly Republican newspaper, which he later sold to a brother-in-law and which later merged with the Evening Express. He next founded the Weekly Mirror.

Yarnell was a candidate on the Prohibition party ticket for an at-large Congressional seat in the 1882 election, but lost. In 1902, he was nominated by the Prohibitionists for a seat in the California State Assembly but campaigned unsuccessfully as an independent.

He died on January 19, 1906. He was survived by his widow, Susan Caystile Yarnell; a son, Ellis, and three daughters, Jessie, Catherine and Esther Yarnell. He also had a brother, George.