60 Years of Hearst

Last week the Hearst empire was 60 years old. In the U.S. Senate, where its founder once hoped to sit, and in the House, where he once did, old acquaintances got off some carefully chosen but occasionally surprising words about William Randolph Hearst. Said Kansas' deaf old (81) Arthur Capper of his fellow publisher: "always. . . a fighting liberal." Said Nevada's George Malone, an old friend of the family: "still his own best editor." Edith Nourse Rogers earnestly told the House that "if ever the term 'public service' requires a synonym, I believe it will be Hearst."

From coast to coast, 17 Hearstpapers dutifully spread fine phrases over their front pages. But the best anniversary story of the day appeared in only one Hearstpaper. A directive over the private wire from San Simeon read: "Chief does not want published in cities outside of San Francisco the 2,500-word . . . story covering 60 years of San Francisco Examiner under ownership and direction of Mr. Hearst."

Taste Without Purpose. The Examiner's exclusive story, carefully edited by the Chief himself, read like a chapter out of an authorized biography of the patriarch of U.S. chain journalism. To set the stage, it went back to W.R.'s dear, dead Harvard days: "If anything, the young Hearst had more of a potential than his fellows. Back of him were an unequaled upbringing, a connoisseur's taste. . . . But, by his own admission, the tall, blond and very elegant heir to mining millions lacked a purpose."

The very elegant heir found a purpose in the Harvard Lampoon; he is proud of the fact that he got it (not the Crimson, as the story said) out of the red. When he went home to San Francisco (the story tactfully ignored his expulsion from Harvard*), his father offered him "everything from the fabulous Homestake Mine to the baronial Mexican ranch." No, said Willie, all he wanted was the broken-down (circ. 5,000) Examiner, which Senator George Hearst had taken in on a $100,000 bad debt.

"In the musty little office on Montgomery Street," said the official biography, "the Examiner's new owner seemed a whirlwind to the sleepy staff. He was everywhere: supervising stories and headlines, scribbling sketches for the cartoonists, writing editorials--breathing life into his foundling. . . . Papers, unlike Topsy, don't 'just grow.' What germinated and nurtured the Examiner shaped the whole course of American journalism.. . ."

The Moving Finger. The authorized version stopped suddenly with young Hearst's 1895 invasion of New York. Old Hearst (in whose presence age is not discussed) was still living out the last chapter last week. In his 84th year (his birthday is April 29), the gaunt old man with haunted eyes is no longer the whirlwind. Neither is life at San Simeon, his 275,000-acre seat of empire, where Hearst once thought nothing of entertaining 80 house guests at a time.

Only a handful of friends, relatives, Hearstlings and other servants last week moved through the great halls at La Cuesta Encantada (The Enchanted Hill), midway between San Francisco and Los Angeles. Hearst was up each day at 11 ("he has always kept morning-paper hours," says Son W. R. Jr.) to read the papers and his mail, write the lordly editorials and memos that kept a copy boy running back & forth to the castle's wire room. His editors get no chance to forget that he is still the boss.

At Court. His guests do not see him until lunch, around 3. When lunch is over, he gives audiences to underlings, some of whom have to wait a week or more in uneasy luxury before seeing him.

Dinner (9:30 p.m.) is only rarely a banquet these days; sometimes there are only W. R. and Marion Davies. Oftener a few regulars show up, like Columnist Louella Parsons, Princess Conchita Sepulveda Pignatelli, society writer of the Los Angeles Examiner. Their host eats heartily (favorite delicacies: cracked crab, pheasant or duck just barely heated), and keeps the table talk on a high plane. Risque stories are out; Hearst recently reprimanded a woman guest who cut loose with a mild "damn." Every night the inevitable movie begins at 11, and bedtime is 1:30 a.m.

Guests say that San Simeon has gone domestic; the zoo full of wild animals is gone; and Old Man Hearst likes to watch his children and grandchildren, and Miss Davies' in-laws, enjoying San Simeon's simpler pleasures, like swimming in the massive pool. The women of the household go in for homey pursuits like crocheting bedspreads or making lamp shades.

Once a month or so the Old Man leaves San Simeon to visit Los Angeles, but he goes to few Hollywood parties. Mostly he sticks to business, firing directives to his editors with the familiar salutation "Chief suggests. ..." A recent one urged all hands to keep paragraphs and sentences short, "so your stories will be understandable."

* After an elaborate practical joke. For Christmas 1885, Hearst sent each of his professors a gift-wrapped chamber pot with the recipient's picture on the inside bottom.

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