The Tryon Daily Bulletin, known as “The World’s Smallest Daily Newspaper,” was established in 1928 by founder Seth Vining Sr. Vining who quickly took on the title “Curb Reporter” for his wanderings in search of the “triumphs and daily doings” of the ordinary people.

In the 1930s the paper printed as a Reader’s Digest size publication. It enlarged to 8.5″ by 11″ in 1955.

Cliff Berryman, a Pulitzer prize-winning cartoonist for the Washington Star and frequent visitor in Tryon, drew the Curb Reporter logo in the 1930s. That logo is still in use today. Vining was editor and salesman and printer, so the townspeople took up writing the stories.

In 1935, Vining moved The Tryon Daily Bulletin offices to the old Bank of Tryon building, sharing space with several other businesses renting there. He purchased the building in 1959.

By 1976, Seth M. Vining Jr. took over the paper. When he retired in 1989 he sold the publication to Jeff and Helen Byrd, and a group of Byrd family friends.

In 2010 the Bulletin is sold to Tryon Newsmedia, LLC. The newly formed North Carolina Company is majority owned by Todd H. Carpenter, president and chief operating officer of Boone Newspapers Inc. Others with ownership are Publisher and President Betty Ramsey, BNI and its key personnel. The new company is managed by BNI.

As they have for years, the people of Polk County write many of the articles. Then they read them. That remains true to a large extent, although today solid local reporting by staff journalists makes up a larger portion of the content.