Hoosier Bargain

Charlotte's Observer, the biggest (circ. 138,183) daily in the Carolinas, is a newspapering nugget of gold that seldom glitters. Its news pages are a typographical mishmash, its editorial voice a whisper. Yet because in its leisurely stride it picks up every crumb of news in its territory, the 82-year-old Observer is one of the biggest profitmakers of its size in the U.S.

Since its longtime publisher, Curtis Johnson, died last October, the rich daily has been run by an editorial board, overseen by banks, has had no top boss. Last week it got one. In as publisher and part owner stepped Hoosier-born Ralph Nicholson, 52, who has made a reputation for picking up bargains on a shoestring. In eight years, he built the rundown New Orleans Item into a moneymaker before selling it, in 1949, at a $600,000 profit. He bought an interest in the Tampa Times and its radio station, which two weeks ago he sold for $825,000 (he still controls Florida's St. Petersburg Independent).

In moving into the Observer, Nicholson made even a shrewder deal, took over operating control without having to buy the paper. The owners agreed to 1) make him undisputed boss, 2) pay him $50,000 a year, 3) sell him 5% to 10% of the paper's stock at a "fair" price. The deal was sealed so secretly that not even Observer editors knew it until they were handed the story to run. If they had any Tarheel resentment at an outlander moving in, they covered it with Southern tactfulness: "Mr. Nicholson," said the Observer story, "was born in Richmond, Ind. [where] his ancestors migrated from North Carolina during the early part of the last century."

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