A Cheechako Takes Over

In the Gold Rush days, Alaska's Indians referred to intruders from the U.S. as "cheechakos"--a corruption of the word Chicago. Last week Larry Fanning, 53, a latter-day cheechako who arrived in Alaska nine months ago after an illustrious twelve years in the competitive world of Windy City journalism, became the owner of the state's only morning newspaper, the Anchorage Daily News (circ. 18,000).

Fanning quit as editorial director of the Chicago-based Publishers' Newspaper Syndicate last September and moved to Alaska after marrying Kay Woodruff Field, second wife of his onetime boss, Marshall Field Jr. Once settled with Kay and her three children, he began looking around for a paper to run, finally bought a 79.4% interest in the News from Publisher Norman C. Brown for an estimated $600,000.

Republican Fanning, who rose from copy boy to managing editor of the San Francisco Chronicle before moving to a series of top editorial posts with Field Enterprises in 1955, plans to spruce up the News's front page and to expand its coverage of the "Lower 48" when he takes over in September. Since its founding in 1946, the paper has been politically independent--and adventurous enough to have become embroiled in seven libel suits. By keeping it that way, Fanning hopes to catch up some day with Anchorage's afternoon Times, whose circulation of 22,000 makes it the biggest state's biggest newspaper.

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