Pulitzer

by James McGrath Morris

  In the early morning: It was so cold that winter that ice closed the Mississippi River for forty-six days. The account of the auction and Pulitzer’s taking possession of the Dispatch is based on reports in the GlDe, 12/10/1878, 1; MoRe, 12/10/1878, 1; and Evening Post, 12/09/1878, 1 and 12/10/1878, 4.

  Arnold raised his bid: The receipt for $2,500 for the purchase of the Dispatch was made out to Arnold. (PLFC) It is not inconceivable that the unknown bidder, like Arnold, was working for Pulitzer, who was far wilier in business than he ever let on.

  During the confusion: GlDe, 12/10/1878, 1. McCullagh may have had a hand in writing the comment.

  The following day: Evening Post, 12/10/1878, 1; Clayton, Little Mack, 132.

  The answer was: Pulitzer continued this strategy of deception for so long that later a reporter for the Globe-Democrat complained about “his old tactics that have puzzled many a news-gatherer”: GlDe, 8/19/1879, 5.

  Pulitzer’s antics gained: GlDe, 12/11/1878, 4.

  St. Louisans already: The size of Allen’s investment was disclosed when the paper went bankrupt five months later. See PD, 5/10/1879, 1.

  Dillon’s Evening Post: Further, the Post was wrongly perceived as a pawn of the Globe-Democrat because of Dillon’s identification with McCullagh and his use of the Globe-Democrat’s presses. The Post did have a similar look, but it hardly deserved to be called an “illegitimate offspring,” the description given to it by the unfriendly Republican. For these and other reasons, the Post had not yet found a readership large enough to sustain it.

  Although the flagging: For the first time since the panic of 1873, being a newspaper publisher was looking again financially attractive. There were 718 daily newspapers published that year in the United States, a number that had remained relatively stable for four years. With improved economic conditions, the number was beginning to rise again. Nearly 100 new dailies were being launched, a 13 percent increase in the number of papers. This was part of an upward trend. Within a decade the total number of papers would more than double: George P. Rowell & Company Data on the Number of Newspapers and Periodicals: 1868–1908, reprinted in Lee, The Daily Newspaper in America, app., table X, 720–721; Douglas, The Golden Age of the Newspaper, 132.

  Pulitzer openly professed: PD, 12/21/1878, 2.

  Pulitzer’s timing was: ChTr, 9/13/1872, 4.

  The two men: The merger agreement and accompanying documents, PLFC.

  The new paper: PD, 12/13/1878, 2; JSR, 65.

  The declaration was: Merger agreement, PLFC.

  Anyone who knew: GlDe, 12/13/78, 4.

  CHAPTER 13: SUCCESS

  Before the Post and Dispatch: Figures for the actual press runs are contained in the Fogarty Collection.

  In the following weeks: The purchase from Hoe marked the beginning of a long and important relationship between Pulitzer and this manufacturer of printing presses. Within a few years, Hoe would push his engineers to their limits in creating larger and faster presses to meet Pulitzer’s demands at the New York World.

  Years before, when: PD, 12/19/1878, 2, quoted in JSR, 45.

  He was on to something: Pulitzer’s return to St. Louis coincided with a period when the leadership of the city was changing from an older, conservative group to a younger, more progressive one. See Moehle, “History of St. Louis, 1878–1882.”

  Like an editorial Paul Revere: PD, 1/30/1879, and 1/31/1879, 2.

  As the campaign: The series began in PD, 2/15/1879, 1. McCullagh, in particular, was singled out because he earned $30,000 in stock in addition to his salary, and owned diamonds and watches.

  When citizens file: PD, 3/1/1879, 8 and 3/21/1879, 2, for an example of the tax oath; PD, 2/17/1879, 2; JSR, 52.

  Pulitzer concluded that: PD, 2/24/1879, 2; JSR, 55. Documents in the Fogarty Collection confirm the increases in circulation claimed publicly by the paper. Pulitzer was a rare publisher in that the circulation figures he announced matched those kept in the actual books.

  There was hardly anything: PD, 1/2/1879, 1 and 2. Pulitzer’s staff would fall prey to the same journalistic prank twenty years later, when he was competing with William Randolph Hearst.

  The Post and Dispatch: PD, 3/28/1879, 2 and 2/21/1879, 1.

  Pulitzer was not easily: JSR, 55–56.

  On Tuesday: PD, 2/18/1879, 1.

  For days, the: PD, 2/19/1879, 1.

  After weeks of delay: PD, 05/26/1879, 2; PD, 3/11/1879; JSR, 63.

  Despite the paper’s: DCS-JP, 197.

  After concluding his: Stealey, 130 Pen Pictures of Live Men, 345–347.

  The street urchins: William Smith to JP, 10/26/1902, JP-CU.

  On April 21, 1879: PD, 4/21/1879, 4, and 4/22/1879, 4.

  Pulitzer didn’t have time: WAS, 60.

  Neither Dillon nor: The terms of the loan were cleverly written. There were three parties to the agreement. The Post-Dispatch turned over title to its property to Gottschalk for $1. In turn, he lent the money to Pulitzer, who provided it to the paper. Then a series of postdated checks were written for the interest on the loan, to be cashed at intervals, and for the final balance. Should the checks not clear, Gottschalk would have recourse to sell the assets of the corporation. PLFC.

  Lawyers who researched: William Smith to Joseph Medill, 2/18/1880, M 0258, Box 3, Folder 2, WHS-IHS.

  With his new: PD, 3/5/1879, quoted in JSR, 69.

  Nothing was too: JSR, 70.

  Watching with dismay: PD, 5/14/1879, 1; GlDe, 5/14/1879, 8. The original sale agreement with the name of Theodore Lemon, PLPC.

  Joseph settled the pregnant Kate: Corbett and Miller, Saint Louis in the Gilded Age, 72; Eberle, Midtown, 13. See JSR, 292, and WRR, 102, for discussion of whether Kate Pulitzer was snubbed by St. Louis society.

  Usually Kate, with: Galveston Daily News, 5/31/1883, 7; Stealey and Johnson diary entries, quoted in WRR, 103.

  Dillon agreed to sell: GlDe, 11/30/1879, also reprinted in PD, 12/05/1879, 4. The actual cost of buying out Dillon is unknown, although several sources cite $40,000.

  Joseph reorganized the: JP to Dillon, Reel II, SLPA, 3/21/1905.

  That night, Cockerill: WP, 12/22/1879, 2; King, Pulitzer’s Prize Editor, 92–93.

  The challenge that: In fact, the postage bill for mailing the Globe Democrat to out-of-town newspapers exceeded that of all other St. Louis papers combined; Clayton, Little Mack, 106–107.

  CHAPTER 14: DARK LANTERN

  Chambers put his: PD, 12/17/1879, 4; MoRe, 12/12/1879, 3.

  After a week’s: On the day appointed for the auction, about 150 curious onlookers and newspapermen gathered at the courthouse. After waiting thirty minutes past the announced starting time, a man showed up and announced that the sale had been postponed: MR, 1/1/1880, 8, and 1/7/1880, 5; PD, 1/7/1880, 4; ChTr, 1/8/1880, 5.

  Rather than a funeral: William Henry Smith, the general agent for the Western Associated Press, acquitted Pulitzer of any deception and ruled that the certificate could not rightfully belong to the mortgage holders. (W. Henry Smith to Joseph Medill, 2/18/1880, WHS-IHS.)

  His exuberance stemmed: PD, 1/7/1880, 4.

  At home, his: Information about servants obtained from 1880 census records. Two of the women who worked for the Pulitzers were Irish-born; MoRe, 12/16/1880, 3.

  Unencumbered by financial: SeDe, 1/8/1880, 1.

  By one o’clock: WaPo, 1/13/1880, 4; GlDe, 1/23/1880, 1.

  Awakened with the news: PD, 1/23/1880, 1 and 4; GlDe, 1/23/1880, 1.

  In New York: ChTr, 1/28/1880, 11; WaPo, 1/26/1880, 2.

  Reports from Cockerill: Church records on file at the Diocesan Archive at Washington Episcopal Cathedral.

  “Now damn you”: GlDe, 3/2/1880, 4; PD, 3/2/1880. Pulitzer admitted the following day that he had drawn a gun but said he was so blind without his glasses that he could have done no damage. One of the bystanders picked up the weapon and placed a notice in the newspaper that if the owner wanted to retrieve it, he could do so at the bystander’s house.

  Early
in the race: PD, 2/15/1879, 4. Pulitzer stuck fast to his opposition to Tilden. See, for instance, PD, 2/12/1881, 4. Pulitzer’s early interest in determining the Democrats’ 1880 candidate led Hutchins at the Washington Post to suggest that Pulitzer’s efforts could save the expense and trouble of a convention. (WaPo, 7/14/1879, 2.)

  If Pulitzer could: PD, 4/28/1880, 4.

  Missouri Democrats gathered: Stealey, 130 Pen Pictures, 347; WaPo, 5/28/1878, 1.

  The convention, which: See Official Proceedings of the National Democratic Convention, 1880; Watterson, Marse Henry, Vol. 2, 249–250.

  Pulitzer face a quandary: WaPo, 6/25/1880, 1; JP to English, 6/27/1880, N-YHS.

  The Democrats’ choice: JSR, 133–134

  On his return: ChTr, 6/27/1880, 2; JP to Smith, 6/27/1880, N-YHS.

  The Evening Chronicle’s: JSR, 110–111.

  Pulitzer was comforted: Ibid., 105–106; PD, 4/30/1880, 4.

  On August 8: Johnson, Diary, 8/8/1880, and subsequent entries, WRR 98–99.

  To get the nomination: Edward C. Rafferty, “The Boss Who Never Was: Colonel Ed Butler and the Limits of Practical Politics in St. Louis, 1875–1904,” Gateway Heritage (Winter 1992), 54–73.

  Butler had a simple: For a discussion of Pulitzer’s payment of the fee, see JSR, footnote 36, 151. Rammelkamp believed that there was some dispute over whether Pulitzer actually paid a fee. It was, however, a common practice and was required of all candidates at the time. Furthermore the Globe-Democrat, edited by the rather scrupulous McCullagh, said that Pulitzer had paid. (GlDe, 9/26/1880, 6.)

  Believing that his nomination: JP to Smith, 7/21/1880, N-YHS.

  Pulitzer was pleased: Ibid.

  On the evening of August 14: Indiana Sentinel, 8/15/1880. “A masterly effort,” said the Washington Post; “a disheartening failure,” said the New York Times. Late in life, Pulitzer thought it one of the best speeches he ever delivered. (JP to FDW, 10/13/1903, SLP.)

  As the primary: PD, January 10, 1879, 2. Pulitzer even went so far as to cancel a speech in Indiana so as to see to his own election. (Fort Wayne Daily Sentinel, 9/14/1880, 4.)

  With Allen’s entry: GlDe, 9/26/1880, 6.

  Calling Pulitzer a demagogue: For a description of the 1879 Senate race, see JSR, 45–47; PD, 9/24/1880, 4; MoRe, 9/24/1880, 1, 4.

  The Republican greeted: MR, 9/25/1880, 4; results from GlDe, 9/26/1880, 6; Johnson, Diary, 9/25/1880; WRR, 99.

  When Pulitzer lost: Johnson, Diary, 9/27/1880, WRR, 99.

  Pulitzer wasted no time: DCS-JP gives Lucille’s birth date as September 30, 1880, but St. Louis’s birth records give it as October 3. In either case, Joseph was in New York at the time: NYT, 9/30/1881, 5; BrEa, 9/30/1880, 4.

  Following the party leaders’: AtCo, 10/5/1880, 1; BoGl, 10/01/1880, 1.

  Pulitzer had one: Indianapolis Sentinel, 10/8/1880, copy in JP-LOC, Box 1, October 1880 folder.

  Despite the size: Ohio Democrat, 10/28/1880, 2.

  Pulitzer the journalist: JSR, 138.

  When Election Day came: Not all the elections that year were unfavorable. On November 23, Pulitzer was elected vice president of the Western Associated Press: NYT, 11/24/1880, 5.

  CHAPTER 15: ST. LOUIS GROWS SMALL

  On many nights: William Gentry Jr., “The Case of the Church Bells,” Bulletin Missouri Historical Society, Vol. 10, No. 2 (January 1954), 183; Dacus and Buel, A Tour of St. Louis, 116.

  Neither the Post-Dispatch: St. Louis Spectator, 12/24/1881, MHS.

  A few printers: PD, 5/12/1881, quoted in JSR, 198–199. Eventually, after Pulitzer moved to New York, the Post-Dispatch permitted a closed shop.

  Pulitzer claimed that: ThJo, 10/23/1886, quoted in JSR, 196.

  Pulitzer talked Daniel Houser into: NYT, 6/19/1881, 5.

  There was one paper: ThJo, 12/20/1884, 6; JN to JP, 3/10/1900.

  Almost as if: WRR, 74.

  In September, the president: ChTr, 9/10/1881, 1; WaPo, 9/10/1881, 1.

  When his turn: PD, 9/10/1881, 1; George Barnes Pennock letter, NYW, 11/3/1911.

  At the beginning: PD, 9/12/1881, 1. However, Pulitzer became so nervous about being alone in his negative predictions that he resorted to filing a few encouraging dispatches. Within days, though, he was back in his role as a doomsayer.

  On September 15: PD, 9/15/1881, 1; WaPo, 9/16/1881, 1; NYT, 9/16/1881, 1.

  The tide of: NYT, 9/17/1881, 1; PD, 9/17/1881, 1.

  On Monday morning: PD, 9/19/1881, 1, quoted in WRR, 75; Ackerman, Dark Horse, 427.

  The day after: PD, 9/20/1881, 4.

  The success of: Circulation figures, PLFC.

  Pulitzer trumpeted the: PD, 6/1/1882, quoted in JSR, 206.

  As a consequence: WaPo, 1/23/82, 2.

  The hostility grew: ChTr, 3/25/82, 5; also see JSR, 292.

  In March, on: WaPo, 3/22/1882, 2; PD, 3/16/1882, 4.

  Perhaps inspired by: APM, 167–177.

  During his years: ThJo, 12/20/1884, 6.

  If the railroad: PD, 10/14/1880, 4; NYW, 5/13/1883, 1.

  Gould became Pulitzer’s: PD, 3/18/1882, 4 and 7.

  Broadhead aroused the: Donald F. Brod, “John A. Cockerill’s St. Louis Years,” Bulletin, Vol. 26, No. 3 (April 1970), MHS, 232.

  In his office: Compiled press accounts. See, for instance, ChTr, 10/16/1882.

  News of the shooting: Daily Kennebec Journal, 10/16/1882, 2.

  Slayback’s friend Clopton: Sarah Lane Glasgow to William Glasgow, 10/18/1882, William Carr Lane Collection, MHS.

  On October 18: Harper’s Weekly, 11/4/1882 quoted in JSR, 289; circulation figures, FP.

  As part of: ChTr, 10/19/1882, 3; Janesville Daily Gazette, 10/24, 1882, 2; JSR, 292, note 26.

  By November, Pulitzer: St. Louis Spectator, 11/11/1882, MHS.

  One of the men: Turner, When Giants Ruled, 105; ThJo, 1/15/87, 12.

  A few hours later: Julius Chambers, quoted in APM, 231.

  CHAPTER 16: THE GREAT THEATER

  One of the most persistent myths about Pulitzer was that he purchased the New York World while in New York with Kate preparing to board a ship for Europe. In fact, Pulitzer had been stalking the paper for months. See, for example, the Springfield Republican, 2/19/1883, 4.

  On April 7: NYT, 4/4/1883; Klein, The Life and Legend of Jay Gould, 315–319.

  He decided to: NYW, 5/13/1883, 1. “The only changes I can suggest would cost money,” one of the paper’s managers had written a few months earlier—hardly glad tidings to bring to the boss (Elmer Speed to William Hurlbert, 1/15/1883, WP CU).

  In January, Gould: WaPo, 1/28/1878, 2; ChTr, 1/25/1883, 3; PD, 4/11/1883, quoted in JSR, 297.

  On the day: R. L. Cotteret to Edwin H Argent, 3/3/1883, JP-CU. For a sample of the reporting sheet, see January–June 1883 folder, JP-CU, Box 4.

  On the way: WaPo, 4/7/1883, 4; Smith to JP, 8/6/1887, WP-CU.

  This purchase, unlike: ThJo, 4/19/84, 4; ChTr, 4/16/1883, 5.

  Pulitzer did not: Renehan, The Dark Genius of Wall Street, 3.

  On April 28: The original contract is among the JPII-LC Papers. Conkling later billed Pulitzer for the services; see JP to Conkling, 12/19/1885, WP-CU. His role as Pulitzer’s lawyer in the purchase is detailed in Atchison Daily Globe, 11/19/1887, 1.

  He confessed his anxiety: JSR, 302. Later in life, Joseph often credited Kate with giving him the resolve to go through with the deal. See RP to John C. Milburn, of Carter, Ladyard & Milburn, 1/5/1912, JP-CU. Pulitzer’s friends Watterson and Melville Stone, who co-owned the Chicago Daily News, both later claimed that he asked them to become partners in the World after he bought it. That seems highly unlikely, as Pulitzer never wanted a real partner in any enterprise.

  Word of the: GlDe, 05/06/1883, 6.

  On May 9: The New York Herald, which printed the Journal, disclosed that it was running off 50,000 copies a day: NYT, 5/23/1883, 8; APM, 205–210.

  At the Fifth Avenue Hotel: NYH, 5/10/1883, 8.

  Escorting Pulitzer around: DCS-JP, 135–136.

  While
Joseph made: APM, 205–206.

  There may have been: Herald editorial, reprinted in NYT, 5/23/1883, 8.

  A few weeks: APM, 210.

  For those who had watched: Charles Gibson to JP, 5/14/1883, JP-CU; John H. Holmes to JP, undated but certainly between May and June 1883, JP-CU, Box 5.

  Taking from his bag: NYW, 5/12/1883, 1.

  Then—also as he: Stephen Richardson, JP-LC, Box 11, Folder 8.

  What they found: In Albert’s unpublished memoir, he makes mention of having been the first to introduce ears. But as the Journal from those months no longer exists, the claim cannot be confirmed.

  But if the new World: NYT, 11/5/1911, SM3.

  During the following days: Walt McDougall, “Old Days on the World,” American Mercury (January 1925) 22.

  As the staff: NYW, 5/10/1908.

  Finished with the city room: NYS, reprinted in GlDe, 5/27/1883, 10; GJ, 303.

  The paper abandoned: NYW, 5/31/1883, 1. The New York Times opted for DEAD ON THE NEW BRIDGE.

  If the headline: JP memo, 1899 or 1900, quoted in GJ, 48, footnote.

  Pulitzer had an uncanny: NYW, 5/29/1883, 1.

  The World’s stories: NYW, 1/25/1884, 4, quoted in GJ, 34.

  As was inaccuracy: AI, 111.

  In his first weeks: NYW, 5/29/1883, 4 and 5/30/1883, 8.

  The Pulitzers moved: ChTr, 7/31/1883, 1.

  Even though work: Among the guests were General Grant and Schurz: NYT, 6/8/1883, 5; WAS, 89–91, Hirsh, William C. Whitney, 227; Rocky Mountain News, 11/8/1883, 4. The club permitted entry to the Republican Roscoe Conkling.

  Pulitzer even found time: The telegraphs and invitations for the boat ride may be found in JP-CU, Box 5.

  Pulitzer may have taunted: NYW, 9/30/1883, 4.

  In August, Pulitzer: ChTr, 8/6/1883, 2.

  By the end of August: Circulation was 27,620 on August 12, 1883, according to the notarized statements that Pulitzer began publishing in the paper; see GJ, 332. Also NYW, 8/11/1883, 4.

  On August 28: NYT, 8/29/1883, 2 and 8/30/1883, 8. Pulitzer knew several of his traveling companions, such as August Belmont Jr., the son of the eminent banker, and the journalists Herbert Bridgman and Noah Brooks.

  Pulitzer was surprised: NYW, 9/9/1883, 4 and 9/10/1883, 8.

  During Pulitzer’s absence: Davenport Gazette, 09/08/1883, 2; BrEa, 9/30/1883, 2.