The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst

Really enjoyable biography, 600 pages but reads like a novel.

This book is about William Randolph Hearst, the political publishing magnate who drew opinions so strong that Orson Welles that modelled Citizen Kane on him.This book might be a little dated now. It was first published in 2000, and has been sitting on my “To Read” list since that time. I’ll be honest. I knew little about the Hearst family before starting this book. I was aware of Patty Hearst, and the SLA, and that Welles portrayed Hearst as a megalomaniacal puppeteer who pulled people’s strings across the US, to watch them jump to his tune.Naturally, things are… more complex than that. Was Hearst a Anti-WWII, red baiting Anti-Communist yellow journalist who could be both racist and Anti-Semitic in his later life? Absolutely. He was most of those things, most of his life, and it almost cost him everything in the late 1930. Yet he could also be a pro-municipal ownership Democrat, many of whose positions were taken on by FDR. The book will encourage you to see him both ways. Like everyone, Hearst is complicated.In short, the book is thorough, and will give you a nuanced view of Hearst. It’s just possible you might not always like him, though, by the end of the book.

Very good

While a number of the other reviewers discuss the merits or the actions of William Randolph Hearst, my comments are directed more at the book itself. I found this book by accident while browsing my favorite bookstore. This book by Nasaw seemed to jump out at me. I was not aware of the book prior to this time, but Hearst is an almost a mythical figure in American pop culture and business history so I was eager to learn about the man and bought this inexpensive paperback version.As a book it is an engrossing read. It transports the reader effortlessly back to the late 1800's where we follow the volatile and fluctuating fortunes of his father George, a self made mining speculator from Missouri, and his mother, many years younger than George. We learn of her spending, meddling in Williams personal life, her many houses, and her European travels. We follow the education of William Hearst at Harvard, his expulsion for missing exams, and then his successes and climb to fame in the newspaper business. I found the story to be compelling at first but then to slow somewhat after page 200 or so - it is almost 600 pages long - because his story is complicated and the book is filled with details.His first job after flunking out of Harvard is to run the San Francisco Examiner, owned by his (by now very rich) father. That is correct! He went from second or third year at Harvard to CEO of the Examiner in one step after some holidays and writing. We learn about the economics of a two penny paper and hear about the exploits of Pulitzer and others. His father was part owner a number of famous mines including the Anaconda copper mine and he had money to fund the Examiner running the paper at a loss as a hobby and as a mechanism to stay involved in California politics.William took it over after leaving Harvard - still in his early to mid twenties. It reminds me a bit of Donald Trump and his launch by his father Fred into Manhattan real estate. But after this running start with his father's deep pockets, William seems to find an inner drive that propels him almost in competition with his father.William had a deep well of youthful restless energy, and is able to focus it on turning around the Examiner into a profitable business. He continues to expand on his own after his father's death, but his next successful paper in New York was funded largely from the estate run by his mother. The estate continues to fund him or subsidize his business, political ambitions, and lifestyle for the next ten years or more.But with his high energy, he develops or borrows production and marketing techniques, hires good writers, sells lots of papers, expands again to Chicago and beyond, and gets involved in related ventures on and on. Along the way he is of course is distracted by the spending of the money, politics, runs for office in the US Congress, New York city as mayor, governor of New York State, President, etc. All his campaigns except Congress fail. But his business success is real and encompasses movies, news, papers, and magazines. We learn of his other distractions and other people, especially women.It is all very fascinating tale, and made even better by three excellent sets of black and white photographs of the Hearst family, and William's famous properties, and the girl friend Marion Davies.Very highly recommend

Something of a monster but Hearsts life worthy of the effort in this tome.

For the price paid it was a very good buy. Only issue was packaging as it had become torn and left book exposed. It had obviously been dropped in mud too. Once book was opened and wiped clean it was ok.

Arrived in perfect condition

The Chief is a well researched and excellent addition to the life of William Randolph Hearst who built the Hearst media empire. This is not a Hearst can do no wrong type of biography and strikes a very balanced tone in assessing the Chief's successes and his failures. There is excellent research done into his family life and how those relationships played out through his parents, his wife and his mistress. His role in newspaper publishing and Hollywood is discussed and for those who had any faith left in the press it will be shattered by the time you are done with this book. The yellow journalism of the Gilded Age and the political machines that were backed by the papers is a fascinating yet scary thing to read about. Don't be put off by the daunting number of pages in the book as it is a quick read and you actually feel as though you want more information in certain areas although given the lack available it is not possible. Overall a truly excellent book and well worth the time to read.

Enjoyable. Informative.

Just finished this book. After reading all 607 pages, I have two general impressions to pass along. The first is that it is, without doubt, a thoroughly researched book to the point that it is as much a reference or text book on the Hearst era as well as a biography of the man. With its 40+ pages of end notes, the author has documented virtually any statement of any important or material fact. However, with that said, I must quickly add that notwithstanding the voluminous end-notes, the references to them (small superscript numbers throughout the text) are not really distracting. They are just there, and after the first page or two, you ignore them, unless, of course, you want to check the source.If it were not for the this second impression, I would have given this book 5 stars. As well written and researched as this book is, I also have to say it is rather hard (tedious?) reading at times. The author has a somewhat disturbing style of using "choppy" sentence structure by breaking them up with parenthetical phases/clauses. After reading the first part of a sentence, often the thought gets interrupted with a subordinate thought or two, and before you're aware of it, you've lost track of what the point of the entire sentence was about--and then have to re-read it to bring the thought together.But, I did enjoy the book very much. It is well worth the price, and well worth reading about this enigmatic, bigger-than-life man who dominated and influenced so many aspects of late 19th and the first half of the 20th century life.

I waited a long time to finally read anything about William Randolph Hearst, but this ebook popped up and I surrendered.It is well written and very detailed, and I felt as if I were actually inside Hearst's head seeing life as he did.I came to understand Hearst's strong emotions and desire for control. I get his strong attachment to his mother and I can somehow accept his love and admiration for Marion Davies.It's just that I could never imagine anyone being so obsessed with material possessions, especially now that I am in my Golden Years and trying to 'downsize.'Unlike Hearst, who continued to buy overpriced or rare objects even when he had no money to pay for them, I am more frequently looking for ways to reduce and divest my own personal possesions (no matter how dear they are to me).At any rate, WRH lived and loved without excuse like no other person of his position and status during the period of his own lifetime.I didn't find his lifestyle to be particularly acceptable to my way of thinking, but his story has to be told and this version by David Nasaw has more than sufficed for me.Enjoy if you will!