List of German-language newspapers of Ontario
German-language newspapers in Ontario began in the 1830s. After English and French, Germans were the third-largest immigrant group in Canada, and many settled in Waterloo County (Berlin, now Kitchener, and Waterloo). From 1859 to 1908, Waterloo County typically had four German newspapers, always between three and five.
Between 1835 and 1914, nine German newspapers started in Berlin and Waterloo, and six more started in Preston, New Hamburg, and Elmira. About 30 German-language newspapers appeared in Ontario between 1835 and 1918. Ontario’s first German newspaper, Canada Museum und Allgemeine Zeitung, began in Berlin in 1835, 18 years before Berlin’s first English newspaper.
These papers mostly reported local news for German communities and had little political influence. Most relied on a small audience and many folded after only a few years. By 1909, Berlin, Waterloo, and New Hamburg each had at least one German newspaper, but most competitors had folded or merged into Berlin’s Berliner Journal (later renamed the Ontario Journal).
On 25 September 1918, during World War I, the Canadian government banned publications in languages of countries at war with Britain. This Order in Council led to the Berliner Journal’s closure. The ban was repealed in January 1920, but no new German-language paper appeared in Ontario until 1967, with the Kitchener Journal, which stopped in 1969.
After World War II, immigration from Eastern Europe and Germany briefly revived German-language papers. Toronto’s das journal ran from 2011 to 2023 and was Ontario’s last German-language newspaper.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 00:22 (CET).