Los Angeles Herald-Examiner
Encyclopedia
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
daily newspaper, published Monday through Friday in the afternoon, and in the morning on Saturdays and Sundays. It was part of the Hearst
Hearst
Hearst may refer to:People* Amanda Hearst* Garrison Hearst, NFL running back* George Hearst* George Randolph Hearst, Jr.* Hunter Hearst Helmsley, WWE professional wrestler* John Randolph Hearst* Lydia Hearst-Shaw* Michael Hearst* Millicent Hearst...
syndicate. The afternoon Herald-Express and the morning Examiner, both of which had been publishing in the city since the turn of the 20th century, merged in 1962. For a few years after this merger, the Herald Examiner claimed the largest afternoon-newspaper circulation in the country.
It published its last edition on November 2, 1989.
William Randolph Hearst
William Randolph Hearst
William Randolph Hearst was an American business magnate and leading newspaper publisher. Hearst entered the publishing business in 1887, after taking control of The San Francisco Examiner from his father...
founded the Los Angeles Examiner in 1903, in order to assist his campaign for the presidential nomination on the Democratic ticket and to complement his San Francisco Examiner. The Los Angeles Herald Examiner Mission Revival
Mission Revival Style architecture
The Mission Revival Style was an architectural movement that began in the late 19th century for a colonial style's revivalism and reinterpretation, which drew inspiration from the late 18th and early 19th century Spanish missions in California....
and Spanish Colonial Revival style building, located at the southwest corner of Broadway and 11th Streets, was largely designed by San Francisco architect Julia Morgan
Julia Morgan
Julia Morgan was an American architect. The architect of over 700 buildings in California, she is best known for her work on Hearst Castle in San Simeon, California...
then associated with Los Angeles architects J. Martyn Haenke and William J. Dodd
William J. Dodd
William J. Dodd was a Canadian-born American architect and designer who worked mainly in Louisville, Kentucky from 1886 to 1912 and in Los Angeles, California from 1912 until his death. Dodd rose from the so-called Chicago School of architecture, engineering and design innovations of the late 19th...
whose contribution to the design is not yet determined by scholars.
Early years
The newspaper was descended from the Los Angeles Examiner, founded in 1903 by William Randolph HearstWilliam Randolph Hearst
William Randolph Hearst was an American business magnate and leading newspaper publisher. Hearst entered the publishing business in 1887, after taking control of The San Francisco Examiner from his father...
as a union-friendly answer to the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
. At its peak in 1960, the Examiner had a circulation 381,037. It attracted the top newspapermen and women of the day. The Examiner flourished in the 1940s under the leadership of City Editor James H. Richardson, who led his reporters to emphasize crime and Hollywood scandal coverage.
The Herald Examiner was the result of a merger with the Los Angeles Herald-Express in 1962. And the Herald-Express was the result of a merger between the Los Angeles Evening Express and Evening Herald in 1931. The Herald-Express was also Hearst-owned and excelled in tabloid journalism under City Editor Agness Underwood, a veteran crime reporter for the Los Angeles Record before moving to the Herald-Express first as a reporter and later its city editor.
The Examiner, while founded as a pro-labor newspaper, moved to the far right over the decades. It was pro-law enforcement and was vehemently anti-Japanese during World War II. Its editorials openly praised the mass deportation of Mexicans, including U.S. citizens, in the early 1930s, and was hostile to liberal movements and labor strikes during the Depression. Its coverage of the Zoot Suit Riots
Zoot Suit Riots
The Zoot Suit Riots were a series of riots in 1943 during World War II that erupted in Los Angeles, California between white sailors and Marines stationed throughout thehi c mlc city and Latino youths, who were recognizable by the zoot suits they favored...
in Los Angeles during World War II also was particularly harsh on the Mexican-American community.
Much of its conservative rhetoric was minimized when Richardson retired in 1957. Underwood remained on staff following the merger in an upper management position, leaving the day-to-day operations to younger editors.
The Hearst Corporation decided to make the new Herald Examiner an afternoon paper, leaving the morning field to the Los Angeles Times. But readers’ tastes and demographics were changing. Afternoon newspaper readership was declining. Following the merger between the Herald-Express and Examiner, readership of the morning Los Angeles Times soared to 757,000 weekday readers and more than 1 million on Sunday. The Herald Examiner’s circulation dropped from a high of 730,000 in mid-1960s to 350,000 in 1977. By the time the Herald Examiner folded in 1989 its circulation was 238,000.
Black Dahlia coverage
The Examiner was the first newspaper to break the story of the dismemberment murder of 22-year-old Elizabeth Short, who was ultimately dubbed the Black DahliaBlack Dahlia
"The Black Dahlia" was a nickname given to Elizabeth Short is an American woman and the victim of a gruesome and much-publicized murder. She acquired the moniker posthumously by newspapers in the habit of nicknaming crimes they found particularly colorful...
by Los Angeles Herald-Express crime reporter Bevo Means.
Examiner reporter Will Fowler was on another assignment with photographer Felix Paegel on January 15, 1947, when they heard a radio call of a mutilated female body founded in a vacant lot on Norton Avenue in the Leimert Park area of Los Angeles. Fowler and Paegel arrived before police and observed the body. Fowler claimed in his autobiography that he knelt down to close Short's eyes before Paegel began shooting pictures. City editor Richardson in his own autobiography had another, more mundane version of the Examiner obtaining the story. He said that reporter Bill Zelinsky called the city desk from Los Angeles Police headquarters to report the discovery of the body and a reporter and photographer were dispatched to the lot where a crowd of newsmen was already assembled.
Whatever the facts were, the morning Examiner scooped the other Los Angeles newspapers by publishing an extra edition two hours before any of the afternoon newspapers hit the streets.
By the late afternoon of January 15, an autopsy on Short was completed by the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office. The victim's fingerprints were scheduled to be airmailed to the FBI fingerprint identification division in Washington, D.C. Examiner Assistant Managing Editor Warden Woolard suggested to Los Angeles police Capt. Jack Donahoe, who was chief of the department’s homicide division, that the victim’s fingerprints be transmitted to the FBI by using the Examiner's new Soundphoto machine. During the early morning hours of Jan. 16, the International News Photo wire service received the prints via photo transmission from the Examiner. Soon afterward, the FBI identified the victim as Elizabeth Short.
In the early afternoon of January 16 an Examiner extra hit the streets, again beating the competition. The Examiner identified Short and provided details of her life growing up in Massachusetts, and details of her adult life in Santa Barbara and later in Los Angeles. The Examiner noted that Short had lived in Los Angeles for a period of time before moving to various other cities in the pursuit of jobs and men. She returned to Los Angeles in 1946 and lived in hotels and rooming houses while visiting a man she had met while living in Florida.
Each day the Examiner came up with more details of Short’s murder and painted her as a lovelorn woman searching for a husband. The Los Angeles Daily News was getting hammered daily by the Examiner. The newspaper's editors were so desperate for fresh stories that they sent rookie reporter Roy Ringer to the Examiner's offices on Broadway. Ringer was new and unknown to Examiner newsmen. He walked into the Examiner’s composing room from off the street and lifted the Black Dahlia story proofs off the spikes and walked out. The Daily News city desk then rewrote the Examiner’s stories. After three days of stealing Examiner copy, Ringer walked into the composing room on the fourth day for a fresh batch of Black Dahlia stories. As he was about to grab a handful of proofs from the spike, someone from behind grabbed his shoulder. Behind Ringer was Richardson. “Nice try”, said Richardson, as he sent Ringer back to the Daily News empty-handed.
At one point an anonymous tip led Examiner reporters to the Greyhound bus station in downtown Los Angeles, where a steamer trunk owned by Short was discovered. Inside were letters, photographs and clothing belonging to the victim. The Examiner obtained the contents and led coverage of Short’s life leading up to her death based on her own personal records and in her own voice. In another instance, more photos, newspaper clippings and letters were anonymously mailed to the Examiner. Richardson often said in subsequent interviews about his years at the Examiner that he believed the letters were from Short’s killer.
The Black Dahlia case was never solved, but for three months it led most of the Los Angeles newspaper's front pages until other sensational homicides replaced it.
Strike
On December 15, 1967, Herald Examiner employees began a strike that lasted almost a decade and resulted in at least $15 million in losses. At the time of the labor strife, the paper's circulation was about 721,000 daily and it had 2,000 employees. The strike ended in March, 1977, with circulation having dropped to about 350,000 and the number of employees to 700. Many veteran reporters left and never returned. As circulation went into free-fall, advertisers were reluctant to use it, and the unions campaigned effectively to its working-class readership, urging them to cancel subscriptions.Despite Hearst's belated efforts to restore some of the paper's luster, the Herald Examiner went out of business November 2, 1989, leaving the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
as the sole city-wide daily newspaper, though the San Fernando Valley
San Fernando Valley
The San Fernando Valley is an urbanized valley located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area of southern California, United States, defined by the dramatic mountains of the Transverse Ranges circling it...
-based Los Angeles Daily News
Los Angeles Daily News
The Los Angeles Daily News is the second-largest circulating daily newspaper of Los Angeles, California. It is the flagship of the Los Angeles Newspaper Group, a branch of Colorado-based MediaNews Group....
has tried to take its place.
Jailing of William Farr
During the 1970 Los Angeles murder trial of Charles MansonCharles Manson
Charles Milles Manson is an American criminal who led what became known as the Manson Family, a quasi-commune that arose in California in the late 1960s. He was found guilty of conspiracy to commit the Tate/LaBianca murders carried out by members of the group at his instruction...
and his followers, who were charged with the 1969 murders of actress Sharon Tate
Sharon Tate
Sharon Marie Tate was an American actress. During the 1960s she played small television roles before appearing in several films. After receiving positive reviews for her comedic performances, she was hailed as one of Hollywood's promising newcomers and was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for...
and six others, Herald Examiner reporter William (Bill) Farr reported in an article that Manson had planned to murder Elizabeth Taylor
Elizabeth Taylor
Dame Elizabeth Rosemond "Liz" Taylor, DBE was a British-American actress. From her early years as a child star with MGM, she became one of the great screen actresses of Hollywood's Golden Age...
and Frank Sinatra
Frank Sinatra
Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became an unprecedentedly successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, after being signed to Columbia Records in 1943. Being the idol of the...
.
Farr was summoned by Judge Charles Older to divulge his sources for the article. Farr refused. But at that time Farr had left the Herald Examiner to work for the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office and later for the Los Angeles Times. Farr cited the California reporters shield law that protected him from revealing his sources, but Older ruled that since Farr was no longer a journalist he was required to hand over his notes.
Farr continued to refuse to reveal his sources and was jailed for 46 days in 1972-73 on a contempt of court citation. Although he was released from custody, his case dragged through the courts for several years. The courts, however, recognized that a journalist could spend the rest of his or her life in jail if they refuse to divulge their sources on moral principle. In 1974, the California state Court of Appeal determined in Re Farr (36 C.A. 3d 577, 1974) that a procedure had to be adopted that allowed the courts to hold a hearing to consider a contempt of court citation involving the shield law. The first issue was whether a reporter was refusing to reveal sources by invoking the shield on “moral principle.” The second consideration by the court was whether incarcerating the reporter would likely induce him or her to reveal the sources. In 1976, the state appellate court finally set aside the contempt citation.
The Farr case in effect strengthened the California shield law and served as a precedent in future shield law cases involving journalists.
Writers and editors
- Jim BellowsJim BellowsJim Bellows was considered to be one of the most influential figures in American journalism of the 20th century. Bellows was born to a wealthy Ohio family, and left home at 13 years of age to attend South Kent School--a private boarding school for boys in South Kent, Connecticut--graduating in 1940...
- Alex Ben Block
- Carl GreenbergCarl GreenbergCarl Greenberg was an American newspaper reporter who began as a police reporter; most of his career he was a reporter covering California and U.S. national politics...
- Harold A. HenryHarold A. HenryNot to be confused with Harold Harby, Los Angeles City Council member 1943–57.Harold A. Henry was a community newspaper publisher who was elected to the Los Angeles City Council in 1945 and was its president for four terms from 1947 to 1962....
, later a community journalist and a Los Angeles City Council member - Andrew JaffeAndrew JaffeAndrew Jaffe was a journalist and executive of Adweek. Jaffee joined Adweek in 1986 and presided over the company as it acquired the Clio Awards for its parent corporation BPI Communications...
- Jim MurrayJim Murray (sportswriter)James Patrick Murray was an American sportswriter at the Los Angeles Times from 1961 to 1998.Many of his achievements include winning the NSSA's Sportswriter of the Year award an astounding fourteen times...
- Louella ParsonsLouella ParsonsLouella Parsons was the first American news-writer movie columnist in the United States. She was a gossip columnist who, for many years, was an influential arbiter of Hollywood mores, often feared and hated by the individuals, mostly actors, whose careers she could negatively impact via her...
Sources
- Will Fowler; Reporters: Memoirs of a Young Newspaperman; Roundtable Publishing; ISBN 0-915677-61-X (hardback, 1991)
- James Richardson; For the Life of Me: Memoirs of a City Editor ; G.P. Putnam's Sons; (hardback, 1954)
- Rob Leicester Wagner; Red Ink White Lies: The Rise and Fall of Los Angeles Newspapers 1920-1962; ISBN 0-944933-80-7; Dragonflyer Press; (paperback, 2000)
- Wayne Overbeck; Major Principles of Media Law; Wadsworth Publishing Co Inc.; ISBN 978-0495050308 (hardback, 2006)
- CTWhite; Website: William J. Dodd 1861-1930~American Architect and Designer~ Sources on History of LA Herald Examiner: LA Times and LA Public Library