Long Fight in St. Louis

No sooner had New York's Samuel I. Newhouse added the St. Louis Globe-Democrat to his chain in 1955 than he began trying to put a new shine on the 103-year-old daily. As publisher he installed Richard H. Amberg, who boosted local coverage, gave big play to public-service projects. In the process, Amberg shuffled some job assignments, replaced few staffers who left the paper. These changes convinced the St. Louis unit of the American Newspaper Guild that the Newhouse management was going in for a wholesale head-lopping. Last February, deeply suspicious of Newhouse, 332 members stalked off their jobs.

By this week, with neither side giving an inch, the Globe-Democrat strike had become one of the longest and bitterest in recent U.S. journalism.

Positions of Strength. Both sides considered themselves in strong positions. The St. Louis guild is aggressive and well heeled, over the years has brought minimum newspaper salaries to a scale second only to New York. With members drawing up to $80 a week strike pay, the guild says that only four have reported switching to new, permanent jobs, only 10% have taken part-time jobs to last out the strike. Last week the guild laid plans to put out its own morning daily.

As for Newhouse, he admits that the Globe-Democrat has lost about $2,000,000 in advertising revenues since the strike began, estimates that it may cost him as much as $1,000,000 more to get the paper back to its prestrike position. Newhouse is now transferring Globe executives temporarily to other jobs within his chain, has managed to cut his out-of-pocket strike costs to some $20,000 a month. At that rate, with a dozen other moneymaking papers in his string, Newhouse can afford to hold out indefinitely. With the guild demanding to know in advance of Newhouse's reorganization plans so it can intercede for affected members, Newhouse refuses, insists on a free hand to make operational changes for efficiency's sake. "I'm not optimistic about an agreement," said Newhouse las.t week. "The strike might go on for a year."

The Public Interest. So far, the only apparent beneficiary of the strike at the morning Globe has been the bigger, richer afternoon Post-Dispatch. Since the strike began, the Post-Dispatch has jumped 60,000 in daily circulation to 465,000.

But last week the Post-Dispatch indicated that it would gladly give up the gains to get back the Globe-Democrat. Said the public-service-minded Post-Dispatch in an unusual editorial: "There is a public interest in the publication of two separate, independent newspapers in this community. We believe the public interest calls for an early settlement. In all too many American cities, newspaper competition has disappeared. The Post-Dispatch does not want to see that happen here."

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