In 1986 Ze'ev Chafets,
an American Jew who
had moved to Israel,
returned for a while
to the states to do
a book about the American
Jewish community;
he entitled the resultant
volume, Members
of the Tribe.
Following an AIPAC
(the powerful Israel
lobbying agency based
in Washington DC)
organizer who was
"hunting Jews" across
America, he noted
an interesting incident
at a Jewish gathering
at the Stardust Motel
in Moline, Illinois.
Chafets writes that
a fellow Jew sitting
next to him in the
audience poked the
American-Israeli in
the ribs, and then
"tapped my copy of
the Quad-City Times
("The Midwest's Most
Exciting Newspaper")
and whispered, 'This
is a Jewish newspaper'
... The man was referring
to ownership, not
content ... Determined
to make an impression,
the man poked me again.
'See this motel?'
he asked. 'It's a
Jewish motel.'" [CHAFETS,
p. 39]
In 1999, the chairman
of the Newspaper
Association of America
was Richard Gottlieb.
He is also the chairman
of Lee Enterprises, based in Davenport,
Iowa, which owns 21
newspapers and 16
TV stations across
the United States
-- from Billings,
Montana, to Madison,
Wisconsin, to Lincoln,
Nebraska. Lloyd Schermer
retired as CEO of
the company in 1999.
A corporate subsidiary,
NAPP Systems, constructs printing plates
for about 350 newspapers
in 30 countries. In
Nebraska too, John
Gottschalk is the
chairman and president
of the Omaha World-Herald company. He is also
publisher of the Omaha
World-Herald.
[BATT, J., 3-24-2000]
In
northern California,
in the heart of the
internationally important
high-tech area of
Silicon Valley, David
Cohen controls an
area-wide empire as
the Publisher/CEO
of the Silicon
Valley Community Newspapers
(SVCN Inc.). Cohen
founded Metro,
"Silicon Valley's
weekly alternative
newspaper." A SVCN
subdivision is Metro
Newspapers. Metro,
in turn , "purchased
the Los Gatos Weekly
and the more than
100-year old Los
Gatos Times-Observer,
which were combined
as the Los Gatos
Weekly Times.
In 1991, the company
acquired the weekly
Saratoga News
and the Willow
Glen Resident
... In 1993, Metro
Newspapers began
publishing a newspaper
in Cupertino, and
acquired its competitor
the Cupertino Courier,
in 1995. The company
founded The Sun
in 1993. The most
recent addition to
the community family
was The Campbell
Reporter, which
began publishing in
March, 1999." [CUEPERTINO
COURIER, 4-11-01]
In
Colorado, Edward Lehman
publishes a few small
town newspapers, including
the Longmont Daily
Times-Call, the
Loveland Daily Reporter-Herald,
and Superior
in Lafayette. The
executive roster for
all these papers includes
Edward Lehman at the
top, Dean Lehman as
president, and Lauren
Lehman as vice-president.
(Ruth Lehman is the
Associate Editor at
the Longmont journal).
In 1975, in New Hampshire,
journalist Kevin Cash
wrote an entire volume
criticizing the concentrated
media and political
power of newspaperman
William Loeb. Loeb
owned New Hampshire's
two major newspapers
-- the Manchester
Union Leader and
the New Hampshire
Sunday News, as
well as the Vermont
Sunday News, and
a few smaller New
England area papers.
Loeb was also in the
habit of writing regular
editorials in his
newspapers. "The truth
is," wrote Cash, a
former reporter at
the Union Leader,
"is that [Loeb's papers]
are to a large extent
monopolistic in nature
within the limits
of New Hampshire."
[CASH, K., p. 3]
Loeb was of
Jewish heritage (both
parents were Jewish);
he once published
in one of his papers,
however, his father's
1906 Episcopal baptismal
document, signed by
American President
Theodore Roosevelt
(his father was Roosevelt's
executive secretary).
In Pittsburgh, Paul
Block (1877-1941)
owned the Pittsburgh
Evening Sun, the
Pittsburgh Morning
Post, and the
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette,
as well as the Toledo
Times and Toledo
Blade. [GREENBERG,
M., p. 53] His sons,
William and Paul,
also later added television
and cable stations
to their mini-empire.
Elsewhere, "in 1978,
the Samuel Horvitz
Trust [run by three
sons and an employee]
owned five monopoly
newspapers in Ohio
and New York, cable
systems in Ohio and
Virginia, and construction
firms in Ohio, and
was a major landowner
in Florida." [BAGDIKIAN,
p. 42]
In a review
of Jewish book publishing
in the United States
to 1976, Jewish author
Charles Madison noted
the following Jewish-founded,
or purchased, firms
(some still exist,
some are now defunct,
some are absorbed
by others):
Simon and Schuster (Richard L.
Simon; Max L. Schuster)
Knopf (Alfred A. Knopf)
Random House (Bennett Cerf and
Donald Klopfer)
Pantheon (founded by Kurt and Helen
Wolf)
Viking (Harold Guinzburg)
Dover (founded in 1943)
Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux - (The father of Roger Strauss --
president of
the publishing company
-- was in turn chairman
of the
Board
of the American Smelting
and Refining Company.
From
1955-65 Roger
was also chairman
of the board of American
Judaism
magazine).
Grove Press (1947) - which controlled
Evergreen Books and
the
Evergreen
Review.
Praeger (1950)
Basic Books (1952) - Its founder, Arthur
Rosenthal, later became
Director of
Harvard University
Press.
The Free Press (1947) - Its founder,
Jeremiah Kaplan, joined
Crowell-
Collier, which
had acquired MacMillan,
as a Vice-President.
Atheneum (1959)
Crown Publishers (1936) (headed in later years by Nat Wartels,
"a legend in the business")
[KRANTZ, J., 2000,
p. 250]
Academic Press
International Universities Press
Twayne Publishers (1948)
World Publishing Company (1905)
Frederick Ungar (1941)
Harry Abrams (1950) - mostly art books.
George Braziller (1955)
Tudor - mostly music books.
[MADISON,
CHARLE;, 1976]
"One
year,' says famous
Jewish novelist Judith
Krantz in her autobiography,,
"when
I cam back from Paris,
I foolishly risked
a certain jail sentence
by
bringing for, buttoned
into my blouse, a
copy of the utterly
pornographic
Rosy Crucifixion
by Henry Miller, an
erotic masterpiece
that Jeremy rented
out to his friendds
as twenty-five cents
a day. I'm not taking
all the credit,
but eventually he
[Jeremy Tarcher]
became the first and
best publisher of
New Age books in the
United States." [KRANTZ,
J., 2000, p. 147]
[Krantz
notes that her novel
Mistral "was quickly
bought for France
by
Edition
Stock, whose publisher,
Jean Rosenthal, as
it happened had
translated my other
novels into French."]
[KRANTZ, J., 2000,
p. 313]
In a continuing
trajectory of percentage
of ownership, by 1968
Roger Kahn noted that
"Jews own perhaps
half the major book
publishing houses:
Random House, Simon & Schuster, New American Library, Alfred Knopf, and Atheneum are a few that thrive under
the leadership of
Jews." [KAHN, R.,
p. 5] "Owners
of new [early to mid-20th
century publishing]
concerns, "notes Jay
Gertzman, "most of
them young Jewish
men (Horace Liveright,
Thomas Seltzer, Ben
Huebsch, Max Schuster,
Alfred Knopf) had
begun to specialize
in presenting European
writers to an American
audience curious about
their sexual frankness
and Marxist ideas.
Established houses,
such as Doran, Houghton,
Appleton, and Doubleday,
did not do so, and
some of their executives
resented their parvenu
colleagues. Modernist
writers especially
owed their exposure
to Jewish firms."
[GERTZMAN, J., 2000,
p. 114]
In the 1980s,
Crown
Books, headed
by Robert Haft (who
also founded the Trak
Auto supply chain),
rose to become the
third largest bookstore
chain with nearly
250 outlets throughout
America. At its peak
the firm was a national
giant with nearly
10,000 employees and
valued between $500
million to $1 billion
(the company drastically
weakened with in-house,
intra-family legal
feuds between Robert
and his father Herbert,
a Jewish immigrant
from Russia). The
Brentano's
bookstore chain
was also founded by
Jewish entrepreneur
August Brentano in
the late 19th century.
Abraham
Rosenbach and his
brother Philip were
used book sellers
from 1903 until the
1950s. In 1928, the
New Yorker called
Abraham "the most
famous dealer in rare
books." "If Gutenberg
[Bible] sales are
taken as the measure
of a dealer," says
Guy Lesser, "Rosenbach
would have to be reckoned
history's most successful
[book dealer], judiging
by his transactions
over ... four decades."
[LESSER, G., JAN 2002,
p. 48, 46] "Whiskey,
cigars, deep-sea fishing,
and women (to put
the last politely),"
adds Lesser, "in roughtly
that order, after
books, seem to have
been his passions."
[LESSER, G., JAN 2002,
p. 48]
Jewish publishers
also brought out the
inexpensive series
for mass appeal, including
the Little Leather Library, the Little Blue Books, and the Modern Library (Horace Liveright); Jewish entrepreneurs also initiated
the "Book-of-the-Month
Club." "As an
author and editor,
[Mortimer] Adler built
a publishing empire
on an unlikely foundation:
the philosophic system
of Artistotle and
St. Thomas Aquinas.
That system influnenced
his work as compiler
of the Great Books
of the Western World
and as editor of Encyclopedia
Britannica." [D'Alessio,
F., 6-29-01] In 2001,
Michael Ross, the
publisher of the World
Book Dictionary, removed
the verb "jew" (traditionally
meaning "beat down
in price") from the
volume. [LEVINE, S.,
JUNE/JULY 2001]
Other Jewish book
publishers include
Westview, Stein and Day, Holmes and Meier, Price Stern Sloan, Lyle Stuart (the founder, Lyle Stuart,
was born Lionel Simon),
Ottenheimer (a Baltimore publisher
with 200 titles a
year), and Schocken. In England, Lord George Weidenfeld not only controls a well-known
namesake publishing
house, he is also
chairman of the Zionist
Federation of Great
Britain. From England,
Andre Deutsch's namesake company published
Norman Mailer, V.S.
Naipaul, Arthur Schlessinger,
and other prominent
authors. In Canada,
Avie Bennett is president
of McClelland & Stewart (1992).
By the late 1990s,
Golden
Books Family Entertainment,
"the nation's largest
producer of children's
books," was headed
by Jewish publisher
Richard Snyder (who
replaced Richard Bernstein).
The next four top
executives at the
firm were also Jewish:
Steven Grossman, James
Cohen, Ira Gomberg,
and Ian Reich. [HOOVER,
p. 255]
Alfred Lilienthal,
a Jew and lifelong
crusader against Zionism
and Jewish chauvinism,
wrote in 1982 that
"All the leading
magazines, ranging
from Commentary,
Esquire, Ladies
Home
Journal, New
York Review of Books,
New Yorker,
and U.S.
News and
World Report have
Jews in key positions
as publishers,
editors, or
managing editors.
No one is able
to criticize Jews
-- or
even take Israel
to task -- for fear
of being out of line
with the boss ...
There is [also]
the constant overriding
concern of the media
about losing
advertising
... at times making
a mockery of
'freedom' of
the press ...
[LILIENTHAL,
p. 219] ... It would
be futile to list
the number of top
Jewish editors
and writers across
the country. Many
of the largest
book publishers,
including Knopf,
Random House, Holt, Liverwright,
Viking Press, Simon and Schuster, Van Nostrand Reinhold, and
Lyle Stuart are Jewish-owned, directly
or by Jewish-controlled
interests (including
CBS,
RCA, Music Corporation of America
[MCA], Litton's, and Gulf and Western. In other firms such
as
Macmillan and Grosset and Dunlap, one will find editors-in-chief
or
presidents who
are Jewish." [LILIENTHAL,
p. 220]
In
the same year, Jewish
literary agent Bill
Adler (formerly the
Executive Editor at
Playboy
when Mike Cohn was
Director of Playboy's
book division) wrote
a volume entitled
Inside Publishing.
Some of the (Jewish)
power people in his
New York publishing
world included
* Richard Snyder: CEO, president
and Chairman of the
Board of
Simon
& Schuster
* Joni Evans: (Snyder's
wife), president of
Simon
& Schuster subsidiary,
The
Linden Press
* Robert Gottleib: President
and Editor-in-Chief
of Alfred A. Knopf
* Louis Wolfe: President
and CEO of Bantam
Books
* Marc Jaffe: Editor-in-Chief
of Bantam
Books
* Hillel Black: Editor-in-Chief
at William
Morrow
* Nat Wartels: Chairman
of Crown
Publishers
* Jonathan Segal: Editor-in-Chief
of Times
Books
* Helen Meyer: President
of Dell
Publishing)
* Phyllis Grann: Publisher
of G.P.
Putnam's Sons
* Jim Silberman: President
of Summit
Books
* Howard Kaminsky: President
and Publisher of Warner
Books
[ADLER, B., 1982]
Adler's favored
choice for assignment
as writing "collaborator"
with celebrities was
Mickey Herskowitz.
Herskowitz wrote books
for Bette Davis, Dan
Rather, Gene Autry,
Jimmy the Greek, and
others. In the "book
packaging" field (where
literary agents produce
anthology-type volumes
commissioned by publishers)
Lyle Kenyon Engel
was "one of the most
prolific book packagers
over the years." [ADLER,
B., 1982, p. 89]
Jewish
actor Kirk Douglas
has written some books
about his life; he
notes his surprise
when he discovered
that
"my editor Ushi was
becoming fascinated
with Judaism [she
eventually converted
to it]. Out
of the blue, in the
fall of 1993, she
announced that she
was going to Israel.
A whole month
in Israel would cost
her a mere $950 plane
fare, food and lodging
included. Could that
be true? Oh yes,
but she was doing
it through an organization
called Volunteers
for
Israel, which basically
meant she was going
into the Israeli Army
for three weeks."
[DOUGLAS,
K., 1997, p. 125]
"Any roll
call of the most respected
and/or powerful figures
in the publishing
world," wrote Robert
C. Christopher in
1989 in a book about
the decline of WASP
institutions," whether
in editorial or executive
positions, has to
include a sizeable
number of Jews; among
those who automatically
come to mind are Robert
Bernstein, Jason Epstein,
and Joni Evans at
Random House, Richard Snyder and Michael
Korda [also author
of Power: How to
Get It and Success!]
at Simon
and Schuster,
Simon Michael Bessie
at Harper
and Row, Howard
Kaminsky at Hearst
and Marc Jaffe at
Houghton
Mifflin." [CHRISTOPHER,
p. 222]
"I don't
want to sound chauvinistic,"
said Jason Epstein
in 2001, "but [Jewish
publishers] were smarter
than their gentile
colleagues." [GREEN,
D., 5-31-01]
Others Jews in positions
of power in earlier
years (as noted by
Martin Greenberg in
1979) included the
publisher of Collier's
and the Women's
Home Companion,
founder and editor
of the National
Guardian, the
editor and founder
of AB Bookman's
Weekly, the editor
of the Saturday
Review, senior
editors at Time,
Forbes and
Newsweek, the
editor of Variety,
a member of the Board
of Editors for Fortune,
the editor-in-chief
of Redbook
and on and on. [GREENBERG,
1979]
More recently, take,
for example, a 1996
report in Advertising
Age that noted
that Ellen Levine,
the editor-in-chief
of Good Housekeeping,
was having a spat
with her publisher,
Alan Waxenberg, and
that Jerry Kaplan
was one of those being
considered to replace
him. [KELLY, p. 47]
In 1994, Barbara Grossman
left Simon
and Shuster to
become the publisher
at Viking
where Peter Mayer
was the Viking
Penguin CEO. In
the same era, Joni
Evans (born Joni Goldfinger)
became the head of
the Turtle Bay imprint at Random House. Tina Brown, also
Jewish, was described
by one London newspaper
as "the most famous
woman editor in the
world ... [She is]
the worst social climber
since Kong lumbered
to the top of the
Empire State Building."
[LANGTON, J.]
In England,
in 1998 the (London)
Daily Telegraph
noted Gail Reubuck,
"daughter of affluent
Baltic Jewish immigrants,"
as "the most powerful
figure in British
publishing," and "recently
voted Publisher of
the Year." [CAMPBELL,
p. D4] Another example
is Richard Malina
who started out as
a lawyer for Grosset and Dunlap. By 1985 he was
the President of the
publishing division
of Doubleday; in 1987 he became the Executive
Director and Publisher
of the Jewish Publication Society. [GODFREY,
p. 2]
A mere random
look at a few 1998
issues of Publishers
Weekly evidenced
the following items:
Al Silverman retired
as "Editor-at-large"
at Penguin. He was also the former publisher
and editor-at-large
at Viking, and chairman and CEO of the
Book
of the Month Club. Mark Lieberman was the Executive
Vice President of
Cahner's
Publishing Company,
which publishes Publishers Weekly where Sybil Steinberg
was the Senior
Editor for Fiction.
Jane Friedman was
the CEO and president
of HarperCollins. Martha Levin was named
the new Vice President
and editor-in-chief
at Hyperion (moving over from a position
as Senior Vice President
at Doubleday. Lucianne Goldberg was noted
as the literary agent
for Linda Tripp (who
exposed the President
Clinton-Monica Lewinsky
sex scandal. Goldberg
-- formerly Steinberger
-- is the wife of
Sid Goldberg, former
editor of the North American Newspaper Alliance,
and later vice president
of United
Media, a syndicator
of news stories. One
of Lucianne's own
novels is Madame
Cleo's Girls,
a "frothy tale about
three high-class prostitutes.'
[HUBBARD, p. 111])
The Bantam
Doubleday Dell International
CEO in 1998 was Stephen
Rubin. The president
and editor-in-chief
of Summit
Books was still
Jim Silberman. Marc
Jaffe was publisher
of his own imprint
at Houghton Mifflin. Others afforded news
making mention in
the Publishers
Weekly issues
were Jonathan Karp,
an editor at Random
House, Esther
Newberg, an agent
at ICM;
and agents Daniel
Greenberg and Al Zuckerman
of James Levine Communications. The Horowitz-Rae book manufacturing company
was also noted as
sold.
Such Jewish
prominence today is
all over the map.
Michael Hoffman is
the Executive Director
of Aperture,
probably the most
influential "art"
photography journal
and book publisher.
Michael Hirschorn
is editor of Spin,
"the bible of alternative
music." Alan Light
is Editor-in-Chief
of Vibe magazine.
George Hirsch is the
vice-president and
publisher of Runner's
World. Nat Lehrman
was the publisher
of Playboy.
(Richard Rosenzweig
was Playboy
founder Hugh Hefner's
personal Executive
Assistant, Bobbi Arnstein
his personal secretary,
and Howard Shapiro
his chief legal counsel.
By the 1990s, Shapiro
was third in command
of the Playboy empire,
behind only Hefner
and his daughter).
Peter Bart is Editor-in-Chief
at Variety.
Michael Solomon was
named editor of Premiere
in 2000. Lesley Seymour
is the editor of Redbook.
Merle Ginsberg is
the Entertainment
Editor for Women's
Wear Daily. David
Bauer is one of the
Executive Editors
at Sports Illustrated.
David Fine is SI's
photography editor.
Todd Gold recently
left the editorship
of People magazine
to found a company
with fellow Jew Adam
Werbach, recently
stepped down as the
president of the Sierra
Club.
Milton Esterow is
the publisher and
editor of both ArtNews
and Antiques World.
He is also co-editor
and founder of the
American Art Journal. Jonathan Steinberg -- son of notorious
corporate raider Saul
Steinberg -- publishes
Individual Investor
magazine. Steven Brill
founded American
Lawyer and a media
watchdog journal called
Brill's Content
(editor-in-chief:
David Kuhn, formerly
executive editor of
Talk magazine),
and the Court TV
program on television.
(A rival, Peoples'
Court, features
presiding Jewish judge
Jerry Sheindlen and
commentating attorney
Harry Levin. Another
court TV program,
Judge Judy,
features Jerry Sheindlin's
wife, Judy, at the
helm.) For years Jerry
Finkelstein published
the New York Law
Journal. Janice
Kaplan is the Executive
Producer of TV
Guide Television.
Jane Goldman is the
Executive Editor of
California Lawyer.
Rae Anne Marsh is
the managing editor
of Arizona Corridors
Magazine. Steven Cohn edits the Media Industry
Newsletter. Rachel
Newman edits Country
Living. David
Klinghoffer is the
literary editor of
the National Review.
Debbie Rosenberg is
the Managing Editor
of Biography.
Robert Epstein is
the Editor-in-Chief
of Psychology Today.
Adam Garfinkle is
the Executive Editor
of the National
Interest. Michael
Berman co-founded
George magazine.
Baltimore's Style
magazine is owned
by the Baltimore
Jewish Times.
Michael Gewanda
became the editor
of Time (Australia)
in 1993. Peter Newman
edited Canada's prominent
weekly magazine, Maclean's.
Peter Eisenman was
"the father of two
architectural publications
of note, Oppositions
and Skyline."
[ARONSON, S., 1983,
p. 303] And on and
on and on.
