Houston Chronicle
The Houston Chronicle is the largest daily newspaper in Houston, Texas, United States. With the 1995 buyout of its longtime rival the Houston Post, the Chronicle became Houston's newspaper of record.
The Houston Chronicle is the largest daily newspaper owned and operated by the Hearst Corporation, a privately held multinational corporate media conglomerate with $10 billion in revenues. The paper employs nearly 2,000 people, including approximately 300 journalists, editors, and photographers. The Chronicle has bureaus in Washington, D.C., and Austin. The paper reports that its web site averages 125 million page views per month.
The publication serves as the "newspaper of record" of the Houston area. Previously headquartered in the Houston Chronicle Building at 801 Texas Avenue, Downtown Houston, the Houston Chronicle is now located at 4747 Southwest Freeway.
While Houston Chronicle staff formerly published on the ad-supported, non-subscriber site Chron.com, today Chron and Houston Chronicle have separate websites and newsrooms. Houstonchronicle.com, launched in 2012, is a subscriber-only site that contains everything found in the daily print edition.
History
1901–1926: Marcellus E. Foster era
The Houston Chronicle was founded in 1901 by a former reporter for the now-defunct Houston Post, Marcellus E. Foster. Foster, who had been covering the Spindletop oil boom for the Post, invested in Spindletop and took $30 of the return on that investment—at the time equivalent to a week's wages—and used it to fund the Chronicle.The Chronicles first edition was published on October 14, 1901, and sold for two cents per copy, at a time when most papers sold for five cents each. At the end of its first month in operation, the Chronicle had a circulation of 4,378—roughly one tenth of the population of Houston at the time. Within the first year of operation, the paper purchased and consolidated the Daily Herald.
In 1908, Foster asked Jesse H. Jones, a local businessman and prominent builder, to construct a new office and plant for the paper, "and offered half-interest in the newspaper as a down payment, with twenty years to pay the remainder. Jones agreed, and the resulting Chronicle Building was one of the finest in the South."
Under Foster, the paper's circulation grew from about 7,000 in 1901 to 75,000 on weekdays and 85,000 on Sundays by 1926. Foster continued to write columns under the pen name Mefo, and drew much attention in the 1920s for his opposition to the Ku Klux Klan. He sold the rest of his interest to Jesse H. Jones on June 26, 1926, and promptly retired.
Goodfellows
In 1911, city editor George Kepple started Goodfellows. On Christmas Eve 1911, Kepple passed a hat among the Chronicles reporters to collect money to buy toys for a shoe-shine boy.Goodfellows continues today through donations made by the newspaper and its readers. It has grown into a citywide program that provides needy children between the ages of two and ten with toys during the winter holidays. In 2003, Goodfellows distributed almost 250,000 toys to more than 100,000 needy children in the Greater Houston area.
1926–1956: Jesse H. Jones era
In 1926, Jesse H. Jones became the sole owner of the paper. He had approached Foster about selling, and Foster had answered, "What will you give me?" Jones described the buyout of Foster as follows:In 1937, Jesse H. Jones transferred ownership of the paper to the newly established Houston Endowment Inc. Jones retained the title of publisher until his death in 1956.
According to the Handbook of Texas online, the Chronicle generally represented very conservative political views during the 1950s:
... the Chronicle generally represented the very conservative political interests of the Houston business establishment. As such, it eschewed controversial political topics, such as integration or the impacts of rapid economic growth on life in the city. It did not perform investigative journalism. This resulted in a stodgy newspaper that failed to capture the interests of newcomers to the city. By 1959, circulation of the rival Houston Post had pulled ahead of the Chronicle.
Jones, a lifelong Democrat who organized the Democratic National Convention to be in Houston in 1928, and who spent long years in public service first under the Wilson administration, helping to found the Red Cross during World War I, and later famously under the Roosevelt administration, described the paper's mission in these terms:
I regard the publication of a newspaper as a distinct public trust, and one not to be treated lightly or abused for selfish purposes or to gratify selfish whims. A great daily newspaper can remain a power for good only so long as it is uninfluenced by unworthy motives, and unbought by the desire for gain. A newspaper which can be neither bought nor bullied is the greatest asset of a city or state. Naturally, a newspaper makes mistakes in judgment, as it does in type; but, so long as errors are honestly made, they are not serious when general results are considered.
The success or failure of a particular issue is of little consequence compared with the all-important principle of a fearless and honest newspaper. This I intend the Chronicle shall always be, a newspaper for all the people, democratic in fact and in principle, standing for the greatest good to the greatest number, championing and defending what it believes to be right, and condemning and opposing what it believes to be wrong.
Such have always been the policies of the Chronicle and to such it is now rededicated."
Under Jones' watch, the Chronicle bought KTRH, one of Houston's oldest radio stations, in 1929. In 1954, Jones led a syndicate that signed on Houston's third television station, KTRK-TV.
1956–1965: John T. Jones era
The board of Houston Endowment named John T. Jones, nephew of Jesse H. Jones, as editor of the Chronicle. Houston Endowment president, J. Howard Creekmore, was named publisher. In 1961, John T. Jones hired William P. Steven as editor. Steven had previously been editor of the Tulsa Tribune and the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and credited with turning around the declining readership of both papers. One of his innovations was the creation of a regular help column called "Watchem", where ordinary citizens could voice their complaints. The Chicago Tribune later called this column a pioneer and prototype of the modern newspaper "Action Line".Steven's progressive political philosophy soon created conflict with the very conservative views of the Houston Endowment board, especially when he editorially supported the election of Lyndon B. Johnson, the Democratic candidate for president. However, more than political philosophy was involved: Robert A. Caro revealed in his biography of Johnson that written assurance of this support from John T. Jones had been the price demanded by Johnson in January 1964 in return for approval of the merger of Houston's National Bank of Commerce, in which Jones had a financial interest, with another Houston bank, the Texas National.
In 1964, the Chronicle purchased the assets of its evening newspaper competitor, the Houston Press, becoming the only evening newspaper in the city. By then, the Chronicle had a circulation of 254,000—the largest of any paper in Texas. The Atlantic Monthly credited the growth to the changes instigated by Steven.
In the summer of 1965, Jones decided to buy a local television station that was already owned by the Houston Endowment. He resigned from the Houston Endowment board to avoid a conflict of interest, though he remained as publisher of the Chronicle. On September 2, 1965, Jones made a late-night visit to the Steven home, where he broke the news that the Endowment board had ordered him to dismiss Steven. Jones had to comply. On September 3, the paper published a story announcing that Everett Collier was now the new editor.
No mention was made of Steven or the Houston Endowment board. Houston Post staff wrote an article about the change, but top management killed it. Only two weekly papers in Houston mentioned it: Forward Times and the Houston Tribune. Both papers had rather small circulations and no influence among the city's business community. The two major newspapers in Houston never mentioned Steven for many years thereafter.
1965–1987: J. Howard Creekmore era
John J. Jones left the Chronicle not long after Steven's ouster. J. Howard Creekmore, president of the Houston Endowment, took John Jones' place at the Chronicle. Everett D. Collier replaced Steven as editor. Collier remained in this position until his retirement in 1979.J. Howard Creekmore was born in Abilene, Texas, in 1905. His parents died while he was young, so he was raised by his stepmother. The family moved to Houston in 1920. Howard enrolled in Rice Institute, where he graduated with degrees in history and English. After graduation, he went to work for Jesse Jones as a bookkeeper. Jones took an interest in the young man's career, and put him through law school. Creekmore passed the bar exam in 1932 and returned to work for Jones. He held several positions in the Jones business empire. In 1959, he was named to the board of Houston Endowment, and was promoted to president of the board in 1964.
By 1965, Creekmore had persuaded other directors of Houston Endowment to sell several business properties, including the Chronicle. Houston oilman John Mecom offered $85 million for the newspaper, its building, a 30 percent interest in Texas National Bank of Commerce, and the historic Rice Hotel. Early in 1966, Mecom encountered problems raising the additional cash to complete the transaction. He then began lining up potential buyers for the newspaper, which included non-Houstonians such as Sam Newhouse, Otis Chandler and the Scripps-Howard organization. Creekmore strongly believed that local persons should own the paper. He insisted that Mecom pay the $84 million debt immediately in cash. Mecom cancelled his purchase agreement.
In 1968, the Chronicle set a Texas newspaper circulation record.
In 1981, the business pages—which until then had been combined with sports—became its own section of the newspaper. Creekmore remained as publisher until Houston Endowment sold the paper to the Hearst Corporation.