 The newspaper was founded in 1968, three years after the county boroughs of West Ham and East Ham - both of which had previously been part of Essex - were combined to form the new London Borough of Newham.Prior to that, since the early 1900s the area had been served by the "East Ham Recorder", a slip edition of the "Ilford Recorder".The "Recorder" won the title of National Campaigning Newspaper of the year in 1995.