Newsweek's News

At the Manhattan offices of the Vincent Astor Foundation, the visitor from Washington had some difficulty drafting his personal check for $2,000,000: "I didn't know how the hell to add zeroes after the two million, so I just wrote 'Two million dollars' and went squiggle-squiggle with the pen." This, he explained as he handed foundation officers the check, was an earnest of his intent to pay $8,985,000 for the block of stock they had for sale. And so, with a squiggle-squiggle, Philip L. Graham, 45, president of the Washington Post and Times Herald, took control of Newsweek (weekly circ. 1,442,836).

The Astor Foundation had been looking for someone like Graham since the 1959 death of Philanthropist Vincent Astor, when Astor's 179,700 shares, amounting to a 59% controlling interest in Newsweek, passed to the trust. Eager to sell Newsweek, the foundation promptly, though privately, began hunting a buyer. Among the handful of serious bidders was Newsweek Board Chairman Malcolm Muir, 75, who hoped to enlarge his family's 13% toe hold on the magazine with the Astor shares. But Graham's offer of $50 a share (which was about 24 times the magazine's earnings per share) was $5 better than Muir's best, and Muir lost.

"Oh, Nuts." Graham's buy was a switch for a man whose only interest in Newsweek, until two weeks ago, was that of a fairly regular reader. Then he heard from a friend, New York Investment Banker Charles Spalding, who is also a good friend of Jack Kennedy's, that Newsweek was up for grabs (TIME, Jan. 27). Graham moved so swiftly that the finale caught his own paper by surprise: with Graham in New York on the day word of the sale leaked out. the Post was forced to rely on wire copy for its first story.

Phil Graham has been moving swiftly for most of his professional life. In 1946, then 31. he dropped a law career to become associate publisher of the Washington Post, then owned by Eugene Meyer, Graham's father-in-law. Within six months Graham was publisher; within two years he and his wife owned the voting stock of the Post (a gift from Eugene Meyer), and in 1954 he bought out the Times-Herald, the Post's morning rival. By 1956 he had acquired two television stations and had doubled the Post's circulation.

The Newsweek buy was characteristic. When Graham heard that bidding for the foundation stock had centered around $45 a share, he raised the ante to $50 ("I thought to myself, 'Oh, nuts, don't drag along' "). Meanwhile he had dispatched Post Managing Editor Alfred Friendly to Rome to secure a pledge from W. Averell Harriman. U.S. roving ambassador and an early Newsweek backer, to sell Graham Harriman's 13% Newsweek holding. Then, with Doubleday & Co., Inc. his only remaining competition, Graham helped the Astor trust officers make up their minds by offering hard cash, one-third of it borrowed from a New York insurance company. Getting Newsweek may ultimately cost Graham $15 million, since he has also offered to buy the other 81,620 shares not held by the Astor Foundation.

"I'm Glad I Did It." Graham does not take formal possession of Newsweek until next week, but his weight was felt even before the ink on his earnest check had dried. In as new editor went Managing Editor Osborn Elliott. 36. a 1944 Harvard graduate and former TIME writer, to replace John Denson, who resigned last month to become editor of the New York Herald Tribune. Aging Board Chairman Muir was politely shifted to a resounding but inactive new post as chairman of the executive committee of the board. Malcolm Muir Jr., 45. once heir apparent to his father's desk, was invited to move to Washington in an as yet unidentified capacity on the Post.

As Newsweek's new proprietor, Graham plans to divide his time more or less equally between Washington and New York. Newsweek's neuter approach to the news is bound to yield to Phil Graham's outspoken Democratic liberalism. And Phil Graham himself seemed like a kid with a new toy. "It may be fun and it may be agony," said he of his new venture. "But I'm glad I did it."

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