Background
Melville Elijah Stone was born on August 22, 1848, in Hudson, Illinois, United States. He was the son of Reverend Elijah Stone and Sophia Creighton.
Stone received Master of Arts degree at Yale.
Stone Doctor of Laws at Ohio Wesleyan University in Columbia.
journalist author newspaper publisher
Melville Elijah Stone was born on August 22, 1848, in Hudson, Illinois, United States. He was the son of Reverend Elijah Stone and Sophia Creighton.
Stone graduated from the high school, in 1867. He received a Master of Arts degree at Yale and a Doctor of Laws at Ohio Wesleyan University in Ohio, in Knox College and Middlebury College.
In 1876, Stone, who started out as a reporter, founded the first Chicago penny paper, the Chicago Daily News. The Chicago Daily News was not an initial success, as pennies were not widely used in 1876. According to Harvey, Stone convinced local merchants that employee theft could be reduced if the price of the item was sold for 99¢ instead of $1.00, etc., forcing an employee to make change for sales and less likely to steal money since it required further calculation. Merchants began experimenting with a penny price drop in their goods, meeting with success among their patrons.
An increase in pennies, thought Stone, would help the circulation of his penny paper. When merchants began running low on pennies, Stone purchased several barrels of pennies from the Mint, further increasing their use within the Chicago area. This story is also related in Scot Morris' The Book of Strange Facts and Useless Information, though there is some doubt as to its veracity.
In 1881, Stone established the Chicago Morning News (renamed the Chicago Record). Stone became general manager of the reorganized Associated Press in 1893, and under his direction, it became one of the great news agencies. He retired in 1921.
(Reply of Melville E. Stone to certain American residents ...)
Quotations: "If I had a dollar for every time I smiled secretly having you in my mind I think my bank account would show up millions."
Stone was a president of the Bankers’ Club and Citizens’ Association. He also was the president of the Civil Service Reform League.
Quotes from others about the person
“Energetic and resourceful as a news executive, Stone also was a thoughtful observer of the workings of American journalism. In 1914, Stone was a man who for twenty-one years had been a manager of the most relentless recorder of episodes in the history of the planet - the Associated Press. In his contradictoriness, Stone was typical of those who govern American news-gathering organizations. He knew that the products of thought and inquiry were more important than scuttlebutt, but, of necessity, he was a creature of deadlines and journalistic close calls. The remarkable thing is that his nature encompassed the contradictions and encompassed them happily.” - Michael Kirkhorn
In 1870, Stone married Martha McFarland. They had three children, Herbert Stuart, Melville Edwin, and Elizabeth Creighton.