Joseph Alsop
Encyclopedia
Joseph Wright Alsop V was an American
journalist and syndicated newspaper columnist from the 1930s through the 1970s.
; the son of Joseph Wright Alsop IV (1876–1953) and his wife Corinne Douglas Robinson
(1886–1971). His mother was the niece of Theodore Roosevelt
and was also related to President James Monroe
. Both his parents were active in Republican politics. His father sought the governorship of Connecticut several times, his mother founded the Connecticut League of Republican Women in 1917, and both served in the Connecticut General Assembly.
Alsop graduate from Groton
in 1928 and from Harvard
in 1932.
education. He began his career with the New York Herald Tribune
, which after three years sent him to Washington, D.C.
to cover the Senate
.
Because of his family ties to the Roosevelts, Alsop soon became well-connected in Franklin Roosevelt's Washington. By 1936 the Saturday Evening Post had awarded him a contract to write about politics with fellow journalist Turner Catledge
. Two years later, the North American News Alliance (NANA) contracted Alsop and Robert E. Kintner
to write a nationally-syndicated column on a daily basis. His first book The 168 Days (1938), covering Roosevelt's unsuccessful campaign to enlarge the Supreme Court, became a bestseller.
In 1940, Alsop and Kintner moved from NANA to the New York Herald Tribune.
In 1941, after it had become clear that the United States would soon enter World War II
, Alsop and Kintner suspended their column and volunteered for the armed forces. Alsop entered the Navy
and used his political connections to be assigned to Claire Chennault
's American Volunteer Group
, later famous as the Flying Tigers
, as Staff Historian, while the group was training at Toungoo, Burma. While on a supply mission for Chennault in December 1941, Alsop was captured and interned at Hong Kong
by the Japanese. Repatriated on the neutral liner Gripsholm
, he rejoined Chennault in Kunming, China
and served with him for the rest of the war.
After the war, Alsop resumed his journalism career, now working with his brother Stewart Alsop
to produce on a thrice-weekly piece called "Matter of Fact". The use of the word "fact" reflected Alsop's pride in producing a column based on reporting, rather than opinions pieces like those of many columnists. While his brother Stewart remained headquartered in Washington to cover domestic politics, Joseph traveled the world, covering foreign affairs. Their partnership lasted from 1945 until 1958, when Joseph became the sole author of "Matter of Fact" until his retirement in 1974.
The Alsops once described themselves as "Republicans by inheritance and registration, and...conservatives by political conviction." Despite his identity as a conservative Republican, however, Alsop was an early supporter of the presidential ambitions of Democrat John F. Kennedy
and became a close friend and influential adviser to Kennedy after his election in November 1960. Alsop was a vocal supporter of America's involvement in Vietnam
, which led to bitter breaks with many of his liberal friends and a decline in the influence of his column.
A noted art connoisseur and collector, he delivered six lectures at the National Gallery of Art
in Washington on The History of Art Collecting in the summer of 1978.
Joseph Alsop was at work on a memoir when he died at his home in the Georgetown section of Washington, D.C.
, on August 28, 1989. The memoir was published posthumously as I've Seen the Best of It.
a closely guarded secret all of his life. Richard Helms
called him "a scrupulously closeted homosexual." Nevertheless, Senator Joseph McCarthy
insinuated that Alsop was homosexual in the course of a dispute with the Saturday Evening Post about its coverage of his campaign to remove "perverts" from government employment. When McCarthy implied that Alsop was not "healthy and normal," a Post editor vouched for him: "I know Alsop well, and I know he is a man of high character, with great courage and integrity."
Early in 1957, the KGB
photographed him in a hotel room in Moscow
having sex with another man, a Soviet agent. He rebuffed Soviet attempts at blackmail
, instead writing "a detailed account of the incident and a relevant narrative history of his sex life". It has been described as "brimming with revelations about Alsop's sex life on several continents," including a report that one of his lovers was Arthur H. Vandenberg, Jr.
, who resigned as Dwight Eisenhower's appointments secretary in 1953. His accounts, delivered to a friend in the CIA, quickly reached the FBI, allowing J. Edgar Hoover
to spread the information through the Eisenhower administration, many of whose members had fought sharp battles with Alsop. Hoover told Lyndon Johnson about the Moscow incident in 1964, and Johnson told Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara
about Alsop's FBI file.
In 1965, Alsop complained to friends that Johnson was tapping his phone, a claim that infuriated the President, who believed that he protected Alsop from McCarthy's attacks years before. Alsop told White House Press Secretary Bill Moyers
that he believed the Administration was tapping his phone and spreading gossip about his personal life, all in an attempt to stop leaks. When Moyers reported the charges to the President, Johnson ordered Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach
to be certain no such wiretap was in place and protested that he never ordered one: "I'm as innocent of it as I am of murdering your wife," he told Katzenbach.
In the 1970s, the Soviets sent Alsop's embarrassing photos to several prominent American journalists without consequences. As a consequence, Alsop considered making his homosexuality public to end the harassment, but ultimately did not.
published Washington, D.C.
, a novel in which the character of a gay journalist is loosely based on Alsop.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
journalist and syndicated newspaper columnist from the 1930s through the 1970s.
Early years
Alsop was born into a socially prominent family in Avon, ConnecticutAvon, Connecticut
Avon is a town in the Farmington Valley region of Hartford County, Connecticut, United States. , the town had a population of 18,098.Avon is a suburb of Hartford. Avon Old Farms School, a prestigious boarding school, is located there. In 2005, Avon was named the third-safest town in America by...
; the son of Joseph Wright Alsop IV (1876–1953) and his wife Corinne Douglas Robinson
Corinne Alsop Cole
Corinne Alsop Cole was the daughter of Douglas Robinson and his wife Corinne Roosevelt and a niece of Theodore Roosevelt....
(1886–1971). His mother was the niece of Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...
and was also related to President James Monroe
James Monroe
James Monroe was the fifth President of the United States . Monroe was the last president who was a Founding Father of the United States, and the last president from the Virginia dynasty and the Republican Generation...
. Both his parents were active in Republican politics. His father sought the governorship of Connecticut several times, his mother founded the Connecticut League of Republican Women in 1917, and both served in the Connecticut General Assembly.
Alsop graduate from Groton
Groton School
Groton School is a private, Episcopal, college preparatory boarding school located in Groton, Massachusetts, U.S. It enrolls approximately 375 boys and girls, from the eighth through twelfth grades...
in 1928 and from Harvard
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
in 1932.
Journalism career
After graduating from Harvard, Alsop became a reporter, then an unusual career for someone with an Ivy LeagueIvy League
The Ivy League is an athletic conference comprising eight private institutions of higher education in the Northeastern United States. The conference name is also commonly used to refer to those eight schools as a group...
education. He began his career with the New York Herald Tribune
New York Herald Tribune
The New York Herald Tribune was a daily newspaper created in 1924 when the New York Tribune acquired the New York Herald.Other predecessors, which had earlier merged into the New York Tribune, included the original The New Yorker newsweekly , and the Whig Party's Log Cabin.The paper was home to...
, which after three years sent him to Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
to cover the Senate
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
.
Because of his family ties to the Roosevelts, Alsop soon became well-connected in Franklin Roosevelt's Washington. By 1936 the Saturday Evening Post had awarded him a contract to write about politics with fellow journalist Turner Catledge
Turner Catledge
Turner Catledge was an American journalist, best known for his work at The New York Times. He was Managing Editor from 1952-1964, at which time he became the paper's first Executive Editor. After his retirement in 1968, he served briefly on the board of the New York Times company as a vice president...
. Two years later, the North American News Alliance (NANA) contracted Alsop and Robert E. Kintner
Robert E. Kintner
Robert E. Kintner was an American journalist and television executive, who served as president of both the National Broadcasting Company and the American Broadcasting Company ....
to write a nationally-syndicated column on a daily basis. His first book The 168 Days (1938), covering Roosevelt's unsuccessful campaign to enlarge the Supreme Court, became a bestseller.
In 1940, Alsop and Kintner moved from NANA to the New York Herald Tribune.
In 1941, after it had become clear that the United States would soon enter World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Alsop and Kintner suspended their column and volunteered for the armed forces. Alsop entered the Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
and used his political connections to be assigned to Claire Chennault
Claire Lee Chennault
Lieutenant General Claire Lee Chennault , was an American military aviator. A contentious officer, he was a fierce advocate of "pursuit" or fight-interceptor aircraft during the 1930s when the U.S. Army Air Corps was focused primarily on high-altitude bombardment...
's American Volunteer Group
American Volunteer Group
The American Volunteer Groups were volunteer air units organized by the United States government to aid the Nationalist government of China against Japan in the Second Sino-Japanese War...
, later famous as the Flying Tigers
Flying Tigers
The 1st American Volunteer Group of the Chinese Air Force in 1941–1942, famously nicknamed the Flying Tigers, was composed of pilots from the United States Army , Navy , and Marine Corps , recruited under presidential sanction and commanded by Claire Lee Chennault. The ground crew and headquarters...
, as Staff Historian, while the group was training at Toungoo, Burma. While on a supply mission for Chennault in December 1941, Alsop was captured and interned at Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...
by the Japanese. Repatriated on the neutral liner Gripsholm
MS Gripsholm (1925)
MS Gripsholm was an ocean liner, built in 1925 by Armstrong Whitworth in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England for the Swedish American Line for use in trans-atlantic traffic from Gothenburg to New York City...
, he rejoined Chennault in Kunming, China
Kunming
' is the capital and largest city of Yunnan Province in Southwest China. It was known as Yunnan-Fou until the 1920s. A prefecture-level city, it is the political, economic, communications and cultural centre of Yunnan, and is the seat of the provincial government...
and served with him for the rest of the war.
After the war, Alsop resumed his journalism career, now working with his brother Stewart Alsop
Stewart Alsop
Stewart Johonnot Oliver Alsop was an American newspaper columnist and political analyst.Born and raised in Avon, Connecticut, Alsop attended Groton School and Yale University...
to produce on a thrice-weekly piece called "Matter of Fact". The use of the word "fact" reflected Alsop's pride in producing a column based on reporting, rather than opinions pieces like those of many columnists. While his brother Stewart remained headquartered in Washington to cover domestic politics, Joseph traveled the world, covering foreign affairs. Their partnership lasted from 1945 until 1958, when Joseph became the sole author of "Matter of Fact" until his retirement in 1974.
The Alsops once described themselves as "Republicans by inheritance and registration, and...conservatives by political conviction." Despite his identity as a conservative Republican, however, Alsop was an early supporter of the presidential ambitions of Democrat John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
and became a close friend and influential adviser to Kennedy after his election in November 1960. Alsop was a vocal supporter of America's involvement in Vietnam
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
, which led to bitter breaks with many of his liberal friends and a decline in the influence of his column.
Personal life
In 1961 he married Susan Mary Jay Patten, the widow of William Patten, an American diplomat who was one of Alsop's friends. By this marriage he had two stepchildren, William and Anne. They divorced in 1978.A noted art connoisseur and collector, he delivered six lectures at the National Gallery of Art
National Gallery of Art
The National Gallery of Art and its Sculpture Garden is a national art museum, located on the National Mall between 3rd and 9th Streets at Constitution Avenue NW, in Washington, DC...
in Washington on The History of Art Collecting in the summer of 1978.
Joseph Alsop was at work on a memoir when he died at his home in the Georgetown section of Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, on August 28, 1989. The memoir was published posthumously as I've Seen the Best of It.
Sexuality
Alsop kept his homosexualityHomosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
a closely guarded secret all of his life. Richard Helms
Richard Helms
Richard McGarrah Helms was the Director of Central Intelligence from 1966 to 1973. He was the only director to have been convicted of lying to the United States Congress over Central Intelligence Agency undercover activities. In 1977, he was sentenced to the maximum fine and received a suspended...
called him "a scrupulously closeted homosexual." Nevertheless, Senator Joseph McCarthy
Joseph McCarthy
Joseph Raymond "Joe" McCarthy was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957...
insinuated that Alsop was homosexual in the course of a dispute with the Saturday Evening Post about its coverage of his campaign to remove "perverts" from government employment. When McCarthy implied that Alsop was not "healthy and normal," a Post editor vouched for him: "I know Alsop well, and I know he is a man of high character, with great courage and integrity."
Early in 1957, the KGB
KGB
The KGB was the commonly used acronym for the . It was the national security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 until 1991, and was the premier internal security, intelligence, and secret police organization during that time.The State Security Agency of the Republic of Belarus currently uses the...
photographed him in a hotel room in Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
having sex with another man, a Soviet agent. He rebuffed Soviet attempts at blackmail
Blackmail
In common usage, blackmail is a crime involving threats to reveal substantially true or false information about a person to the public, a family member, or associates unless a demand is met. It may be defined as coercion involving threats of physical harm, threat of criminal prosecution, or threats...
, instead writing "a detailed account of the incident and a relevant narrative history of his sex life". It has been described as "brimming with revelations about Alsop's sex life on several continents," including a report that one of his lovers was Arthur H. Vandenberg, Jr.
Arthur H. Vandenberg, Jr.
Arthur Hendrick Vandenberg, Jr. was a Republican government official from Michigan. He worked for many years on the staff of his father, Arthur H. Vandenberg , who served in the U.S. Senate from 1928 to 1951...
, who resigned as Dwight Eisenhower's appointments secretary in 1953. His accounts, delivered to a friend in the CIA, quickly reached the FBI, allowing J. Edgar Hoover
J. Edgar Hoover
John Edgar Hoover was the first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the United States. Appointed director of the Bureau of Investigation—predecessor to the FBI—in 1924, he was instrumental in founding the FBI in 1935, where he remained director until his death in 1972...
to spread the information through the Eisenhower administration, many of whose members had fought sharp battles with Alsop. Hoover told Lyndon Johnson about the Moscow incident in 1964, and Johnson told Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara
Robert McNamara
Robert Strange McNamara was an American business executive and the eighth Secretary of Defense, serving under Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson from 1961 to 1968, during which time he played a large role in escalating the United States involvement in the Vietnam War...
about Alsop's FBI file.
In 1965, Alsop complained to friends that Johnson was tapping his phone, a claim that infuriated the President, who believed that he protected Alsop from McCarthy's attacks years before. Alsop told White House Press Secretary Bill Moyers
Bill Moyers
Bill Moyers is an American journalist and public commentator. He served as White House Press Secretary in the United States President Lyndon B. Johnson Administration from 1965 to 1967. He worked as a news commentator on television for ten years. Moyers has had an extensive involvement with public...
that he believed the Administration was tapping his phone and spreading gossip about his personal life, all in an attempt to stop leaks. When Moyers reported the charges to the President, Johnson ordered Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach
Nicholas Katzenbach
Nicholas deBelleville Katzenbach is an American lawyer who served as United States Attorney General during the Lyndon B. Johnson administration.-Early life:...
to be certain no such wiretap was in place and protested that he never ordered one: "I'm as innocent of it as I am of murdering your wife," he told Katzenbach.
In the 1970s, the Soviets sent Alsop's embarrassing photos to several prominent American journalists without consequences. As a consequence, Alsop considered making his homosexuality public to end the harassment, but ultimately did not.
Later references
In 1967, Gore VidalGore Vidal
Gore Vidal is an American author, playwright, essayist, screenwriter, and political activist. His third novel, The City and the Pillar , outraged mainstream critics as one of the first major American novels to feature unambiguous homosexuality...
published Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C. (novel)
Washington, D. C. by Gore Vidal is the sixth in his Narratives of Empire series of historical novels . It begins in 1937 and continues into the Cold War, tracing the families of Senator James Burden Day and Blaise Sanford.This book is the least historical and most novelistic of any of the seven...
, a novel in which the character of a gay journalist is loosely based on Alsop.
Publications
- Politics
- The 168 Days (1938) with Turner Catledge
- Men Around the President (1939) with Robert Kintner
- American White Paper: The Story of American Diplomacy and the Second World War (1940) with Robert Kintner
- We Accuse! The Story of the Miscarriage of American Justice in the Case of J. Robert Oppenheimer (1954) with Stewart Alsop
- The Reporter's Trade (1958) with Stewart Alsop
- FDR, 1882–1945: A Centenary Remembrance (1982)
- Memoirs
- "I've Seen the Best of It": Memoirs (1992) with Adam Platt
- Art
- From the Silent Earth: A Report on the Greek Bronze Age (1964)
- The Rare Art Traditions: The History of Art Collecting and Its Linked Phenomena Wherever These Have Appeared (1982)
Sources
- Joseph W. Alsop, with Adam Platt, "I've Seen the Best of It": Memoirs (NY: W.W. Norton, 1992)
- Edwin M. Yoder, Jr., Joe Alsop's Cold War: A Study of Journalistic Influence and Intrigue (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1995)