A regional daily marked its 162nd birthday by holding a day of events in honour of the newspaper.

The Sentinel, Stoke, celebrated ‘Sentinel Day’ on Thursday by inviting what it deemed the 162 most influential people on its patch to gain a unique insight into the paper’s inner workings.

Sentinel Day saw a series of presentations and workshops held on everything from newspaper production, digital publishing, social media and graphic design to news gathering, sports reporting, film-making, photography, commercial, newspaper sales, and the staging of our major public events.

It culminated in a panel discussion on the future of Stoke-on-Trent, entitled ‘2020 Vision’ which asks what kind of Stoke-on-Trent we would all like to be living and working in five years from now.

Sentinel editor Martin Tideswell, second left, with local dignitaries on ‘Sentinel Day’

The event was held on Thursday, the date in 1854 when the first edition of the then weekly ‘Staffordshire Sentinel and Commercial and General Advertiser’ rolled off the presses.

Sentinel editor-in-chief Martin Tideswell said: “This was hands-down, one of the best initiatives we’ve ever done. The feedback has been incredibly positive. I’m told that at one point this morning The Sentinel’s hashtag – #localandproud – was the fourth most popular trending hashtag in the UK.

“To have all those important people – from politicians to the chief execs and MDs of major local employers give up their valuable time to come and spend the day with us and learn more about what we do was quite humbling and showed our pulling power.

“It demonstrated, without doubt, the love of our brand and the fascination people have with our great industry and its many disciplines.

“It underlined that The Sentinel is still by far and away the most relevant and respected media outlet in the county and we have picked up half a dozen great stories, some new contracts and identified numerous sponsorship and partnership opportunities which we’ll be chasing up in the coming days and weeks.

“It was a great way to start 2016 and it was nice to hear so many of our guests say ‘I didn’t know you did that’ after watching a brilliant presentation from the journalists who stage events or shoot and edit bespoke films.”