PM's Little Brother

Sportsman Marshall Field III, having sunk some $1,950,000 into the 5-c- New York tabloid PM, and having called in outside experts to see what was the matter, last week was preparing to back another paper. Result: a prospectus announcing a 32-page national weekly to be launched soon and called Parade. It is to be distributed (starting with an expected 150,000 copies) like The American Weekly or This Week, as a newspaper supplement--or in cities where a newspaper customer cannot be found, to sell separately for 5-c- on the newsstands.

Just one year old now, PM has a circulation of around 75,000 (44,000 within New York City), and PM losses have again mounted to over $30,000 a week.

Last winter it was reported that Backer Marshall Field had set May 1 as the deadline for PM to succeed, but before May 1 he put up another $500,000 to keep PM going four months longer. As a byproduct the new weekly would lighten the burden of PM's $22,000-a-week editorial costs.

Parade's prospectus promises an editorial budget of $100,000 a month. Among its promised "43 Camera Men, 137 Brilliant Reporters," the eight identified are all present /"Mites: Ben Robertson Jr., Kenneth Crawford, Ben Hecht, et al.

Yet one important PM personage is not mentioned in Parade's prospectus--PM Publisher Ralph Ingersoll himself. Not only has he no revealed connection with Parade, but two of its chief executives--vice president and secretary-treasurer--are people with whom Ingersoll does not get along too well. They are William Baumrucker Jr. (PM business manager) and Donald F. Stewart (PM treasurer).

But Backer Field likes them,--and he will be Parade president. Probable editor is William McCleery, now editor of PM's Sunday paper. Offices of Parade will be entirely separate from PM's.

Chances for Parade's success as a national Sunday supplement were rated fair-to-good if it can reassure newspapers that it has broken with the leftist traditions of PM.

*Field also thinks highly of Ingersoll. Columnists Pearson & Allen broadcast last week that Field had turned down LaGuardia's offer of No. 1 assistant on Civilian Defense if he would give up P.M.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.