Paper Losses - Hardcover

Gruley, Bryan

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0802114024 ISBN 13: 9780802114020

Publisher: Grove Press, 2018

Synopsis

Gruley writes of the 25-year struggle between the Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press--two proud, family-owned newspapers that became pawns in the hands of the largest newspaper chains of our time, Gannett and Knight-Ridder. A tale of greed and power, of Wall Street and the courts.

About this title

From the Back Cover

Paper Losses is the story of the twenty-five-year struggle between the Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press, two proud, family-owned newspapers that became pawns in the hands of the largest newspaper chains of our time, Gannett and Knight-Ridder. It is a story of personal ambition and corporate greed, of Wall Street and the courts - but, above all, it is a compelling cautionary tale about American journalism over the last three decades. Between them, the News and the Free Press claimed more readers per capita than any newspaper in any other major American city, but by the late 1980s both were losing millions of dollars a year. With Wall Street looking over their shoulders, Gannett and knight-Ridder sought a peculiar form of government relief that would allow the papers to continue in artificial competition - while promising their parent companies tens of millions of dollars in profits. But the simple solution soon becomes a complicated test of wits and wills between two long-time rivals: Alvah Chapman, Jr., the steely, Bible-reading chairman of Knight-Ridder, and Al Neuharth, the flamboyant leader of Gannett and the founder of USA Today. A battle that begins in Detroit rages across the land, from union halls and corporate boardrooms to the offices of legal legend Clark Clifford and Attorney General Edwin Meese. In the end, what Neuharth and Chapman believed could be settled in a polite chat winds up on the docket of the United States Supreme Court. Bryan Gruley weaves this many-layered and complex story into a fast-paced narrative filled with unforgettable characters and bitter conflicts. As riveting as Barbarians at the Gate, as incisive in its insights into the media business asThe Powers That Be, this consummately reported and passionately told tale is one that has repercussions for all of us.

Reviews

In this emblematic, worrisome and involving account, Gruley, a reporter for the Detroit News Washington bureau, describes how the Gannett Company and Knight-Ridder, owners of the country's two largest newspaper chains, tried to end the competition between their Detroit papers. Gannett, which dominated in the small-town market, had only recently acquired the conservative Detroit News . Knight-Ridder, which included the Philadelphia Inquirer and Miami Herald in its empire, owned the more liberal Free Press . In a strategy to regain dwindling readership and advertisers, the companies in 1986 proposed to form the Joint Operating Agency under which they would merge business operations but maintain separate editorial units. The JOA passed muster with the Justice Department, but protest groups challenged the arrangement until in 1989 the Supreme Court ruled the JOA was legal. Gruley provides deft sketches of the personalities involved as well as accounts of the legal battles and corporate maneuverings. He pulls no punches in discussing his boss, Gannett chairman Al Neuharth, whom he shows to be a hard-driving, vain dealmaker. He also empathetically presents the plight of staff members who worked under Knight-Ridder's threats to shut down the Free Press if the JOA was not approved. Ironically, the papers, according to the author, continue to hemorrhage money despite the JOA takeover--and still face the uncertainty of survival.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

A heartfelt take on two heartland dailies that (following a lengthy battle for local dominance) joined forces after a fashion; by a Detroit News journalist who covered the twisty story's denouement and understands its varied implications. Gruley first provides background on a once-vigorous rivalry between his publication (an afternoon paper) and the Free Press (Motown's morning sheet). While previously profitable, he notes, both began losing big money during the 1980's due to a combination of socioeconomic developments. A 1985 takeover of the News by Gannett (the largest newspaper chain in the US) led to the negotiation of a joint-operating agency (JOA) with the hated Free Press (owned by Knight-Ridder, another fourth-estate colossus). Under terms of such accords, same-city newspapers are allowed to amalgamate their advertising, circulation, production, and allied activities while maintaining separate editorial staffs. By federal law, however, JOAs (which investors favor for their capacity to improve income statements) must be endorsed by the Justice Department--and, after a good deal of acrimonious debate, Attorney General Edwin Meese III approved the News/Free Press agreement. But unions and public-interest groups opposed the limited get-together right up through the Supreme Court, where, in late 1989, they lost their case on a four-to-four vote. Gruley offers tellingly detailed accounts of the roles played by high-profile participants (Clark Clifford, Jack Kent Cooke, Norman Lear, Ralph Nader, Al Neuharth, et al.) and a host of lesser lights in what amounted to a high- stakes game of chicken. He also does a good job of reckoning the costs, concluding that Detroit would have been better served if the market had been left to decide which paper was fittest to survive. In the wake of the protracted, enervating struggle, Gruley observes, neither paper is equipped to compete with, let alone best, rival media. An informative rundown on an encounter that could prove a watershed in the evolution (or devolution) of America's metropolitan dailies. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Edition details

• Publisher: Grove Press
• Publication date: 2018
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0802114024
• ISBN 13: 9780802114020
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 448