Short answers, pulled from the story.
The Press was first published on the 25th of May 1861, from a small cottage on the west side of Montreal Street in Christchurch, New Zealand. The first edition was a six-page tabloid sold for sixpence.
James FitzGerald was the driving force behind the founding of The Press, with John Watts-Russell providing 500 pounds in initial funding. The Reverend John Raven organised practical matters, and Henry Porcher Lance, Henry Tancred, and Richard J. S. Harman also served on the founding committee.
On the 13th of June 1863, The Press published the first part of what became Samuel Butler's Erewhon, under the pseudonym Cellarius and the title "Darwin among the Machines." It was the first appearance of Butler's satirical ideas about machine evolution.
The Press subsidised two small Leyland diesel railbuses to solve slow delivery to the West Coast, where roads were poor and New Zealand Railways refused to reschedule trains to early morning hours. The railbuses began service on the 3rd of August 1936, departing Christchurch at 2:20 am and reaching Hokitika just before 8:00 am.
The February 2011 earthquake badly damaged The Press's main building in central Christchurch, forcing all production to move to a printing plant near Christchurch Airport. Operations remained there until June 2012, when the central building was partially rebuilt and reopened.
The Press is owned by Stuff Ltd. Ownership passed through the Christchurch Press Company, Independent Newspapers Ltd, and Fairfax New Zealand before Fairfax Media merged with Nine Entertainment Co. in December 2018.