The Michigan Daily is the daily student newspaper of the University of Michigan. Its first edition was published on September 29, 1890. It was founded to establish a counterweight to the university's fraternity culture. The newspaper is financially and editorially independent of the school's administration and other student groups, but shares a university building with other student publications.
In 1952, the Soviet delegate to the United Nations, F.A. Novikov, singled out the newspaper as emblematic of American warmongering. Activist and politician Tom Hayden, an author of the Port Huron Statement, later came to personify the publication's editorial philosophy. According to the anthology Special to the Daily, the newspaper was also the original source of the so-called "Paul is dead" hoax, which, among other things, included rumors that hidden audio on the album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band gave clues to the death of Beatle Paul McCartney.
Alumni of the publication include editors and reporters at newspapers including the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun, and Detroit Free Press.
