Background
Charles Henry Grasty was one of the many sons of Methodist manses to achieve distinction in journalism. He was born on March 3, 1863, in Fincastle, Virginia. He was the son of the Rev. John Sharshall Grasty and Ella Giles Pettus.
(This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)
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Charles Henry Grasty was one of the many sons of Methodist manses to achieve distinction in journalism. He was born on March 3, 1863, in Fincastle, Virginia. He was the son of the Rev. John Sharshall Grasty and Ella Giles Pettus.
In 1876, Grasty entered the University of Missouri, but he was compelled for financial reasons to leave in 1880 without graduating.
Grasty became a reporter on the Kansas City Times and at twenty-one, he was made the managing editor of the paper - a position which he held for five years.
From his savings in newspaper work and from some profitable investments in Kansas City real estate, he was able in 1892 to secure the controlling interest in the Baltimore News.
He was soon waging war on the political corruption found in the city, and in this work he was aided by Fabian Franklin who was associated with him as editor of the paper after 1895.
In 1908, he concluded sixteen years of successful management when the News was sold to Frank A. Munsey for a handsome purchase price.
For a brief period, he remained as general manager of the News and then went to St. Paul as editor and controlling owner of the St. Paul Dispatch and the Pioneer Press. His year in that city (1908 - 09) was not happy.
At its close he sold the paper to its old owners and went to Europe with his family. Returning to the United States he secured in 1910 control of the Sun in Baltimore and at once enlarged the Sunday Sun and added the Evening Sun.
At the same time, he renewed his old attacks on the political machine. The fight of the Sun to secure the Democratic convention of 1912 for Baltimore was more successful and in the nomination of Woodrow Wilson, Grasty played a prominent part.
He had seen presidential timber in Wilson while the latter was still president of Princeton University. His crusading campaigns so affected his health that in July 1914, he sought recuperation in Europe and in October of that year severed all connection with his paper.
Even while abroad he could not break away entirely from newspaper work and became a war correspondent for the Associated Press, an organization of which he had been a director from 1900 to Upon his return to the United States in 1916, he served as treasurer of the New York Times, but the business desk chafed him as long as critical events were taking place in Europe and he went back with Gen. Pershing in 1917 with a roving commission as a special editorial correspondent of the Times.
After brief service in the Paris office of the Times, he began a series of tours along the war front which led to many interviews with military and diplomatic leaders and entitled him to a permanent place in a journalistic hall of fame.
(This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)
The judgment that Grasty was “the ablest all-round newspaper man in America” had substantial foundation, for he was familiar with every detail of newspaper technique.
Editor, publisher, and newspaper owner, the role he loved best of all was that of a reporter of stirring events; and in that role he died in London.
On May 29, 1889, almost immediately after leaving the Times, Grasty was married to Leota Tootle Perrin of St. Joseph, Missouri.
