Bargain for Sam

In 38 years at the game, Publisher Samuel I. Newhouse has never exhausted either the will or the cash to buy newspapers. Fortnight ago, he added to his 14 papers by acquiring a healthy $3,600,000 slice of the Denver Post (TIME, June 20). Last week, still hot after bargains, Newhouse made a quick trip to Massachusetts, came home with a $4,000,000 piece of Springfield's three jointly held newspapers.

If anything, the second buy was a better bargain than the first. The Denver Post has been barely scraping by on the balance sheet, but the three Springfield papers--the morning Union (circ. 80,968), the evening News (99,998) and the Sunday Republican (112,352)--produce a cool net profit of $1,000,000 a year.

As usual, Newhouse made his move at just the right time. A tightly held family empire that began with the establishment of, the Republican in 1824 by Samuel Bowles, the papers have remained in the family for four generations. But after the death of Publisher Sherman Hoar Bowles in 1952, the family grip loosened. Sherman Bowles gave 45% of the stock to his wife and four children, but they cannot vote the stock and do not gain possession until 1967. Another 40% was distributed among other relatives, the remaining 15% to the newspaper employees' pension fund.

Newhouse's move was to buy the 40% block and rights to the 45% held by Sherman Bowles's immediate family. Even though employees hold voting rights to the family share through 1967, Newhouse is assured eventual control.

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