Persis Corp., which owns the Honolulu Advertiser,...

Persis Corp., which owns the Honolulu Advertiser, has agreed in principle to acquire the Knoxville Journal from McKinney/McMahan Newspapers Inc. The deal, which is expected to be completed this summer, includes a 25% interest in the Knoxville News-Sentinel Co., the agency that handles business, advertising, circulation, production and printing for the Journal under a cooperative agreement. The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. publishes the Knoxville News-Sentinel, a Scripps-Howard newspaper. Bill McKinney, publisher and manager of the Journal, and Ron McMahan, publisher and editor, bought the Journal from Gannett Co. two years ago for about $25 million but did not disclose how much Persis paid them.