Pulitzer_ A Life in Politics, Print, and Power - James McGrath Morris [155]
Columbia Journalism School. (Courtesy of Columbia University Archive.) Floor engraving. (Courtesy of the author.)
Infirm but not incapacitated, Pulitzer sought to remain in command of his journalism empire. The World alone now had more than 600 editors, reporters, compositors, pressmen, salesmen, and business managers on its payroll. As his absence from New York became prolonged, he appointed three men to run the paper: Cockerill would manage editorial matters, George Turner would manage the business side, and Kate’s brother William Davis would act as Pulitzer’s personal representative when the triumvirate met. To communicate with their absent boss, Turner devised a simple cipher scheme so that telegrams could be coded to save words and keep others from understanding them.
Of his newspapers, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch held the least interest for Pulitzer. It ran itself, produced a handsome income, and gave him no headaches. His heart was in New York, specifically with the affairs of the morning World, referred to as “Senior” in the coded messages of the heavy transatlantic cable traffic. Pulitzer regarded “Junior,” the Evening World, with a mix of disdain and acceptance. With its base, coarse style, it thrived in the hurly-burly domain of sidewalk sales, where a good headline could sell its entire run of 100,000 copies. Pulitzer knew there was a large and growing appetite for afternoon newspapers, with their fresh news, punchy headlines, and scandalous tales. After all, he had started out as a publisher of an evening paper. Still, although it churned out profits, the Evening World was not a maker of presidents. If this were only a matter of money, Pulitzer could have disposed of the whole lot and spent the remainder of his life a wealthy man. Instead, he wanted to keep the reins of the World in his hands because it gave him what he coveted most—power.
Aside from creating his triumvirate, Pulitzer embarked on a scheme of retaining control over the hiring of editors and managers. No matter how sick or how far away he might be, he would be the one to fill the key posts. Editors and managers who performed well would be rewarded by bonuses, conveyed by telegraphed instructions to the cashier. Those who didn’t would face a Pulitzerian wrath in telegraphic form. Sometimes the telegram or letter would even be read aloud to the recipient by one of the members of the triumvirate. An editor knew he worked for Pulitzer, not for the World. Misdirecting his loyalty could mean the end of his employment.
For years, Pulitzer had sought to lure Julius Chambers, whom he had known since 1872, away from the New York Herald. That winter Chambers was chafing under the idiosyncratic rule of his publisher, James Bennett—who, coincidently, was running the Herald from Paris, giving Pulitzer hope that he might do the same. One day Chambers joined Cockerill for lunch in the famous Room 1 of New York’s Astor House. Comparing their experiences in working for absent publishers, Cockerill quickly fathomed Chambers’s unhappiness and handed him a telegram he had received from Pulitzer. “See Chambers again,” it read, “renew offer of $250 per week and three year contract.” Chambers took the job.
By similar means, Pulitzer gained a new editorial writer, hiring George Eggleston from the New York Commercial Advertiser. The new hires quickly learned that Pulitzer intended to manage them as if he were in the office rather than simply the source of telegrams piled thick on their desks. “Never fear of troubling me with any suggestion concerning either the welfare