The Log Cabin Democrat was founded in July 1879, when Able F. Livingston came to Conway from Illinois. Livingston had been a member of the old Whig Party, and even though the party was gone by then, he chose the log cabin - the symbol of the Whig Party - as the name for his newspaper. In March 1885, J.W. Underhill became part owner.

On Jan. 1, 1894, Underhill - by then sole owner - and J. W. Robins, who owned a sawmill, decided to trade businesses. The deal was completed on a creek bank and was the beginning of an almost unbroken succession of Robins family ownership. Five generations of the family have been involved in the newspaper's history.

In the early 1900s, it merged with another paper, the Democrat.

The Log Cabin Democrat started a daily edition with the opening of the Arkansas Normal School, now the University of Central Arkansas, in 1908, and began a Sunday edition in 1979. The paper converted to a morning newspaper on April 2, 2001, and added a Saturday editon to become a seven-day-a-week publication on Sept. 13, 2003.

Stauffer Communications purchased 49 percent of the newspaper stock in 1989.

The Log Cabin Democrat is now wholly owned by Morris Communications Co., which purchased Stauffer Communications in 1995.