William Randolph Hearst

William Randolph Hearst (April 29, 1863 – August 14, 1951) was an American newspaper magnate, born in San Francisco, California. He helped invent "yellow journalism" and the modern large circulation newspaper. As Martin Lee and Norman Solomon noted in their 1990 book Unreliable Sources, Hearst "routinely invented sensational stories, faked interviews, ran phony pictures and distorted real events."

Hearst's use of "yellow journalism" techniques in his New York Journal to whip up popular support for U.S. military adventurism in Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines in 1898 was also criticized in Upton Sinclair's 1919 book, The Brass Check: A Study of American Journalism. According to Sinclair, Hearst's newspaper employees were "willing by deliberate and shameful lies, made out of whole cloth, to stir nations to enmity and drive them to murderous war." Sinclair also asserted that in the early 20th century Hearst's newspapers lied "remorselessly about radicals," excluded "the word Socialist from their columns" and obeyed "a standing order in all Hearst offices that American Socialism shall never be mentioned favorably." In addition, Sinclair charged that Hearst's "Universal News Bureau" re-wrote the news of the London morning papers in the Hearst office in New York and then fraudulently sent it out to American afternoon newspapers under the by-lines of imaginary names of non-existent "Hearst correspondents" in London, Paris, Venice, Rome, Berlin, etc.

He was a prominent leader of the liberal wing of the [[History of the United States Democratic Party| Democratic party]] from 1896 to 1935, when he suddenly turned conservative.

William Randolph was the only child of George Hearst, a successful miner who became a multi-millionaire, and later U.S. Senator from California, and Phoebe Apperson Hearst, a former school teacher from Missouri. While his father was busy losing and re-gaining fortunes, young William toured Europe with his mother. He was enrolled in St. Paul's School in New Hampshire at the age of 15.

Business

William studied at Harvard College (1882–1885), became a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon Fraternity, and worked on the Harvard Lampoon, but was expelled for sending faculty members chamber pots with the recipient's picture adorning the inside bottom.

Searching for an occupation, in 1887 he took over management of a newspaper which his father had accepted as payment of a gambling debt, the San Francisco Examiner. Giving his paper a grand motto, "Monarch of the Dailies", he acquired the best equipment and the most talented writers of the time. A self-proclaimed populist, Hearst went on to publish stories of municipal and financial corruption, often attacking companies in which his own family held an interest. Within a few years, his paper dominated the San Francisco market.

In 1895, with the financial support of his mother, Hearst bought the failing New York Morning Journal, hiring writers like Stephen Crane and Julian Hawthorne and entering into a head-to-head circulation war with his former mentor, Joseph Pulitzer, owner of the New York World, from whom he 'stole' Richard F. Outcault, the inventor of color comics. His was the only major newspaper in the East to support William Jennings Bryan and Bimetallism in 1896. The New York Journal (later New York Journal-American) reduced its price to one cent and attained unprecedented levels of circulation through sensational articles on subjects like crime and pseudoscience. The paper fought tenaciously to liberate Cuba from what it considered a horrible Spanish rule. Both Hearst and Pulitzer published images of Spanish troops placing Cubans into concentration camps where they suffered and died from disease and hunger. The term yellow journalism, which was derived from the name of "The Yellow Kid" comic strip in the Journal, was used to refer to the sensational style of newspaper articles that resulted from this competition. Journalism historians point out that Yellow Journalism was rare outside New York City in 1898, and is unlikely to have affected voters outside Gotham. Hearst did cause the Spanish-American War of 1898, and he certainly publicized it, trying to sell more copies than his rival Pulitzer. They both reached a million copies a day. His own political career suffered after the assassination of President William McKinley when a satirical poem by Ambrose Bierce he had published a few months earlier alluding to a possible McKinley assassination made the publisher look irresponsible. Though he served two terms in the US Congress, Hearst's political ambitions were mostly frustrated.

Expansion

In part to aid in his political ambitions, Hearst opened newspapers in some other cities, among them Chicago, Los Angeles and Boston. The creation of his Chicago paper was requested by the Democratic National Committee and Hearst used this as an excuse for Phoebe Hearst to transfer him the necessary start up funds. By the mid-1920s he had a nation-wide string of 28 newspapers, among them the Los Angeles Examiner, the Boston American, the Atlanta Georgian, the Chicago Examiner, the Detroit Times, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and the Washington Times and Washington Herald and his flagship the San Francisco Examiner. In 1924 he opened the New York Daily Mirror, a racy tabloid frankly imitating the New York Daily News. Among his other holdings were the magazines Cosmopolitan, and Harper's Bazaar; two news services, Universal News and International News Service; King Features Syndicate; a film company, Cosmopolitan Productions; extensive New York City real estate; and thousands of acres of land in California and Mexico, along with timber and mining interests.

The Hearst news empire reached a circulation and revenue peak about 1928, but the economic collapse of the Great Depression and the vast over-extension of his empire cost him control of his holdings. It is unlikely that the newspapers ever paid their own way; mining, ranching and forestry provided whatever dividends the Hearst Corporation paid out. When the collapse came, all Hearst properties were hit hard, but none more so than the papers; adding to the burden were the Chief's now-reactionary politics, increasingly at odds with those of his readers. Refused the right to sell another round of bonds to unsuspecting investors, the shaky empire tottered. Unable to service its existing debts, Hearst Corporation faced a court-mandated reorganization in 1936. From this point, Hearst was just another employee, subject to the directives of an outside manager. Newspapers and other properties were liquidated, the film company shut down; there was even a well-publicized sale of art and antiquities. While World War II restored circulation and advertising revenues, his great days were over. Hearst died in 1951, aged eighty-eight, at Beverly Hills, California, and is buried at Cypress Lawn Memorial Park in Colma, California.

The Hearst Corporation continues to this day as a large, privately-held media conglomerate based in New York City.

Personal life

In 1903, William married Millicent Veronica Willson (1882–1974), a beautiful 21-year-old chorus girl, in New York City. Nearly 20 years her senior, Hearst had been seeing her since she was 16. The couple had five sons: George Randolph Hearst (1904–1972), William Randolph Hearst Jr. (1908–1993), John Randolph Hearst (1910–1958), and twins Randolph Apperson Hearst (1915–2000) and David Whitmire Hearst (1915–1986).

Conceding an end to his political hopes, Hearst became involved in an affair with popular film actress and comedienne Marion Davies (1897–1961), and from about 1919 he lived openly with her in California. Millicent separated from her husband in the mid-1920s after tiring of his longtime affair with Davies, but the couple remained legally married until Hearst's death. Millicent built an independent life for herself in New York City as a leading philanthropist, was active in society, and created the Free Milk Fund for the poor in 1921.

Beginning in 1919, Hearst began to construct (and never completed) a spectacular castle on a 240,000 acre (970 km²) ranch at San Simeon, California, which he furnished with antiques, art, and entire rooms brought from the great houses of Europe. He also bought St Donat's Castle near Llantwit Major in South Wales. As with San Simeon, he spent a fortune renovating the castle, bringing electricity not only to his residence but to the surrounding area. The locals enjoyed having Hearst in residence at the castle; he paid his employees very well, and his arrivals always created a big stir in a community not used to American excesses. Hearst spent much of his time entertaining influential people at his estates. George Bernard Shaw, upon visiting St. Donat's, was quoted as saying: "This is what God would have built if he had had the money."

Political career: from liberal to conservative

A Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives (1903–1907), he narrowly failed in attempts to become mayor of New York City (1905 and 1909) and governor of New York (1906). He was defeated for the governorship by Charles Evans Hughes. His defeat in the New York City mayoral election where he ran under a third party of his own creation (The Municipal Ownership Leauge) is widely attributed to Tammany Hall. Tammany, the dominant democratic organization in New York City at the time (and a widely corrupt one) was said to have used every dirty trick in the book to derail Hearst's campaign. An opponent of the British Empire, Hearst opposed United States involvement in the First World War and attacked the formation of the League of Nations.

Hearst's reputation suffered in the 1930s as his political views changed. In 1932 he was a major supporter of Franklin D. Roosevelt. His newspapers energetically supported the New Deal throughout 1933 and 1934. Hearst broke with FDR in spring 1935 when the President vetoed the Patman Bonus Bill. Hearst papers carried the old publisher's rambling, vitriolic, all-capital-letters editorials, but he no longer employed the energetic reporters, editorialists and columnists who might have made a serious attack. His newspaper audience was the same working class that Roosevelt swept by three-to-one margins in the 1936 election. In 1934 after checking with Jewish leaders to make sure the visit would prove of benefit to Jews, Hearst went to Berlin to interview Hitler. Hitler asked why he was so misunderstood by the American press. Because Americans believe in democracy, Hearst answered bluntly, "and are averse to dictatorship." Conradi p 174

Hearst myth

One of the most influential films of all time was a retelling of Hearst's life in Orson Welles' 1941 film Citizen Kane. Welles and co-writer Herman J. Mankiewicz added bits and pieces from the lives of other rich men of the time, among them Harold McCormick, Samuel Insull and Howard Hughes into Kane. Hearst used all his resources and influence in an unsuccessful attempt to prevent its release. Welles and his studio, RKO, resisted the pressure, but Hearst and his Hollywood friends succeeded in getting the theater chains of the time to limit bookings of Kane, resulting in poor box-office numbers and harming Welles' profits. (Fifty years later, HBO offered a fictionalized version of this event in its picture RKO 281.)

Now, fifty years after his death, Citizen Kane 's reputation seems secure -- it was ranked #1 on the list of the American Film Institute's 100 greatest fims of all time--while Hearst's own image has largely been shaped by the film. While the film paints a dark portrait of Hearst, it was devastating to the reputation of Marion Davies, fictionalizing her as a talentless drunk. Many years later, Orson Welles said his only regret about 'Kane' was the damage it had done to Davies.

Scandal

In 1924, silent film producer Thomas Harper Ince ("The Father of the Western") died, allegedly of a heart attack while on a weekend yacht trip with Hearst, Davies, and other prominent Hollywood personalities. For years, rumors circulated that Hearst had shot Ince, and used his power to cover up the truth. A fictional 2001 film, The Cat's Meow is based on these rumors. Hearst was reportedly extremely jealous of Davies, who had been involved in an affair with Charlie Chaplin (one of several affairs she would be involved in over the years). According to the stories, Hearst went into a rage, mistook Ince for Chaplin, and shot him accidentally. General opinion seems to be that such a cover-up is unlikely, but at that time not entirely impossible.

As a newspaper publisher, Hearst promoted writers and cartoonists despite the lack of any apparent demand for them by his readers. The press critic A.J. Liebling reminds us how many Hearst stars would not be deemed employable elsewhere. One Hearst favorite, George Herriman, was the inventor of the dizzy comic strip Krazy Kat; not especially popular with either readers or editors, it is now considered by many to be a classic, a belief once held only by Hearst himself.

In 1974 Hearst's granddaughter, Patty Hearst, made front pages nationwide when she was kidnapped by an extremist group, the Symbionese Liberation Army, and was soon after caught on film helping the group to rob banks. She renounced the SLA soon after her arrest, and was later pardoned by President Bill Clinton.

References

Hearst, William Randolph, Jr. and Jack Casserly. The Hearsts: Father and Son. 1991.
Liebling, A.J. The Press. 1981.
Lundberg, Ferdinand. Imperial Hearst. 1937.
Nasaw, David. The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst. 2000.
Pizzitola, Louis. "Hearst Over Hollywood: Power, Passion, and Propaganda in the Movies." 2002.
Ben Procter; William Randolph Hearst: The Early Years, 1863-1910 1998.
St. Johns, Adela Rogers. The Honeycomb. 1969.
Swanberg, W.A. Citizen Hearst. 1961.
Wilkerson; Marcus M. Public Opinion and the Spanish-American War: A Study in War Propaganda 1932.

External links

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