(Special commemorative edition celebrating the 100th anniv...)
Special commemorative edition celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Times byAdolph S. Ochs, Sr. Illustrations of front pages on which major historical events occurred. Introductory comments by Adolph S. Ochs, Jr. unpaginated. cloth, dust jacket, still enclosed in original mailing box.. folio..
Adolph Simon Ochs was an American newspaper publisher and former owner of The New York Times and The Chattanooga Times (now the Chattanooga Times Free Press).
Background
Ochs was born to a Jewish family in Cincinnati, Ohio, on March 12, 1858. His parents, Julius Ochs and Bertha Levy, were both German immigrants. He was the eldest of six children. His father had left Bavaria for the United States in 1846. Julius was a highly educated man and fluent in six languages that he taught at schools throughout the South, though he supported the Union during the Civil War. Ochs' mother Bertha had come to the United States in 1848 as a refugee from the revolution in Rhenish Bavaria, and had lived in the South before her 1853 marriage with Julius, sympathized with the South, though their differing sympathies didn't separate their household.
Education
He had only a brief exposure to school. However, his father, a teacher fluent in six languages, tutored the boy.
Ochs always referred to the printing office as his high school and college.
He had received honorary degrees from six institutions.
Career
He became a printer’s devil (apprentice) on the Knoxville Chronicle in 1872 and later a compositor on the Louisville (Kentucky) Courier-Journal. In 1877 he helped to establish the Chattanooga Dispatch, and in July 1878, only 20, he borrowed $250 to buy a controlling interest in the moribund Chattanooga Times, which he developed into one of the leading newspapers in the South. He was a founder of the Southern Associated Press and was its chairman from 1891 to 1894; from 1900 until his death he was a director of the Associated Press.
On August 18, 1896, Ochs acquired control of the financially faltering New York Times, again with borrowed money ($75, 000). To set his paper apart from its more sensational competitors, Ochs adopted the slogan “All the News That’s Fit to Print” (first used October 25, 1896) and insisted on reportage that lived up to that promise. Despite an early shortage of capital, he refused advertisements that he considered dishonest or in poor taste. In 1898, when sales were low and expenses unusually high, he probably saved The New York Times by cutting its price from three cents to one cent. He thereby attracted many readers who previously had bought the more sensational penny papers, especially the New York World and the Journal. By 1900 Ochs was able to purchase a controlling interest in The New York Times.
Ochs was responsible for such innovations as a book review supplement and rotogravure printing of pictures. To make accurate source material available to the public, he began in 1913 to publish The New York Times Index, the only complete U. S. newspaper index.
His last active year was 1932; he died April 8, 1935.
Achievements
The American publisher and philanthropist Adolph Simon Ochs rose from a cultured but impoverished background to control the so-called ideal newspaper, the New York Times.
Ochs was inducted into the Junior Achievement U. S. Business Hall of Fame in 1982.
In 1928 Ochs built the Mizpah Congregation Temple in Chattanooga in memory of his parents, Julius and Bertha Ochs. The Georgian colonial building was designated as a Tennessee Historical Preservation Site in 1979.
Ochs was engaged in crusading against anti-Semitism. He was active in the early years of the Anti-Defamation League, serving as an executive board member, and used his influence as publisher of the New York Times to convince other newspapers nationwide to cease the unjustified caricaturing and lampooning of Jews in the American press.
Personality
Quotes from others about the person
According to a biographer, Ochs at times failed because he had been deceived or misinformed "but he never lied …, the final test of a servant of the truth. "
Connections
In 1884, Ochs married Effie Wise, the daughter of Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise of Cincinnati, who was the leading exponent of Reform Judaism in America and the founder of Hebrew Union College.
His only daughter, Iphigene Bertha Ochs, married Arthur Hays Sulzberger, who became publisher of the Times after Adolph died. Her son-in-law Orvil Dryfoos was publisher from 1961–63, followed by her son Arthur Ochs "Punch" Sulzberger. Her daughter, Ruth Holmberg, became publisher of The Chattanooga Times. Ruth Holmberg's son is Arthur Golden, author of Memoirs of a Geisha. Ochs' great-grandson Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, Jr. has been publisher of The New York Times since 1992.
One of his nephews, Julius Ochs Adler, worked at The New York Times for more than 40 years, becoming general manager in 1935, after Ochs died. Another nephew, John Bertram Oakes, the son of his brother George Washington Ochs Oakes, in 1961 became editorial page editor of the Times' editorial page, which he edited until 1976.
Father:
Julius Ochs
Mother:
Bertha Levy
Spouse:
Effie Wise
She was the daughter of Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise of Cincinnati, who was the leading exponent of Reform Judaism in America and the founder of Hebrew Union College.
Brother:
George Washington Ochs Oakes
Daughter:
Iphigene Bertha Ochs
She married Arthur Hays Sulzberger, who became publisher of the Times after Adolph died.
