Otis Chandler quit, or was pushed off, the governing board of the Chandler family trusts, which serves as the family's power center, after deriding his relatives as right-wing "coupon clippers . Variety is a part of Penske Media Corporation. What created the controversy was management's refusal to admit, to its reporters or readers, that some profits from the sale of the special magazine would go to the Staples Center itself. His relatives complained about the Times's liberal bent -- and he has occasionally suggested that they in turn were knuckle-draggers, out of touch with modern times. We did wild things, although it's all kid stuff by today's standards. His own mother, and the business allies who contributed to her beloved Music Center, pressured him to fire the Times music critic, Martin Bernheimer. Theres no reason why it cant be all three, but in Privileged Son, each element keeps elbowing the other out of the way. We use Lighthouse for a ticketing system and would be lost without it. or "I think that's Kristie." But Norman and Dorothy had other plans. The newspaper he inherited was very like the California of its time -- fat, parochial and happy. Otis Chandler (November 23, 1927 - February 27, 2006) was the publisher of the Los Angeles Times between 1960 and 1980, leading a large expansion of the newspaper and its ambitions. So, sure, I'm sad. There is something mythic about Otis' story. Before Fame In 1944, he handed the reins of the publishing empire to son Norman, who in turn passed it on to his son Otis in 1960. Sure, I'm going through that right now," he explains during our meeting, about three weeks after the deal was announced. I, like you, felt the odd combination of pride, curiosity and shame for peeking into the family photos of Los Angeles' most prominent family. Trade Madness: Knicks, Nets, Rangers, Islanders And Devils Spent February Making Notable Moves, Los Angeles Chargers Have Shown Keenan Allen The Money But They Wont Show Him The Door, The Mandalorian Season 3, Episode 1 Recap And Review: The Apostate Sets The Stage For Whats To Come, Corner Threes Are Secret Sauce For Milwaukee Bucks Offensive Success, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz Could Face Subpoena To Testify Before Congress, Bernie Sanders Says. ", Now that the 100-odd family members are united behind the Tribune sale -- they stand to make about $1.5 billion -- Chandler dismisses the bad feelings as "political tension [that] goes back to my father's day. The site has since grown to nearly 5 million members who have added over 150 million books, completely by word of mouth. The Otis Chandler era at the L.A. Times began on April 11, 1960, when his father introduced him as the new publisher. Amos was born and died in 1785 and is buried in Norfolk. He has a tendency to recount conversations verbatim without identifying his sources. In 1960, his training complete, he became the fourth publisher in the history of the paper. Otis Chandler was born on the 23rd of November, 1927. New Yorker wit S.J. McDougal doesnt have much feel for psychological nuance, so his account of Dorothy Chandlers relationship with her son is one of the books major gaps. All Rights Reserved. People of this zodiac sign like freedom, travel, philosophy, being outdoors and dislike clingy people, constrained, off-the-wall theories. At the same time, the General and his cohort secretly bought more than 44,000 acres in the San Fernando Valley. When he grew into the top job at theTimes,he was that rarity among publishers -- a manager who understood every aspect of the business. McDougal hints that Otis grew to resent his mother for using him in her wars with her in-laws, but he never examines how this might have shaped his behavior. No longer would East Coast papers view it with contempt. A recorded phone conversation reveals former President Nixon's plan to investigate the Chandlers. She blackmailed people into making donations; she used the newspaper (especially the womens pages) to champion her personal causes, and she alternately smothered and intimidated her two children. Under his watch, the L.A. Times opened international bureaus and hired on Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists, at the same time buying several television station and the Newsday newspaper. Buffie seems to have also been a fairly demanding wife; for example, if Norman slouched in his chair during a social dinner, Buff would whisper sharply to him, "Posture, Chan, posture!" Be the first one to, Chandler Family: Olympic Tryouts, Weight lifting, USC v. UCLA, Mt. The 1920s represented an era of change and growth. Lets Examine. Four years after giving birth to her second child, she suffered a nervous breakdown and, at the urging of her husband, she went to see a psychiatrist, a courageous decision for anyone in 1932 but especially for a woman of her status. The paper and the company, of course, were never the same. At 6-foot-2, he claims to have shrunk an inch, but he still towers over most visitors. "This trust is dearer than life itself." Still, to me it seems ridiculous and pretentious for the Chandlers to have looked down on Dorothy. "No Easterner can understand what it has meant in Californiato be a Chandler,"David Halberstam wrote in a famous run-on sentence from his media history, The Powers That Be, "for no single family dominates any major region of the country as the Chandlers have dominated California, it would take in the East a combination of the Rockefellers and the Sulzbergers to match their power and influence.". With a bellicose prose style that blended politics and passion with half-truths and full-blown fiction, McDougal writes, Harrison Gray Otis jammed his personal point of view into every inch of his staunchly Republican newspaper.. Though less personal to him, we were both drawn into the story. I think we have a pretty compelling product today, but in terms of offering a good answer to the question What should I read next? I think we are only at the tip of the iceberg. He led a privileged, isolated life for most of his childhood. Please comment on the subject of the blog post itself. Philip Chandler and Harrison Chandler, as well as a sister, Mabel Otis Booth. This uniquely American saga should stir the interest of specialized distribs and worldwide fests prior to Stateside PBS tube dates. I said, no, I feel fine. Despite the presence onscreen of key Times figures such as former publisher Tom Johnson, editor Bill Thomas and Times Mirror exec Peter Fernald (as well as former Times reporter, author and Times chronicler Dennis McDougal), nobody can get to the bottom of what led Otis Chandler to his inexplicable retreat and surrender of control of the paper in the 1980s. "This trust is dearer than life itself." During the same period that Buff was campaigning for the performing arts complex, her daughter Mia was leading the fundraising drive that created the L.A. County Museum of Art. Hasalyn Harris : News Anchor and Co-Founder of Aloneinforest. It was Downing who blundered into the notorious Staples Center controversy that contributed mightily to her and Willes's downfall. Is this the destiny of the new media? But he leaves little doubt about his opinion of Chandler's accomplishments in the profession that consumed his passion and energy for 50 years. In 1708, he was chosen a member of Her Majesty's Council (at the time, the highest position a native could achieve) and was annually reelected until his death in 1727. In a poll of the Washington press corps, the Los Angeles Times ranked among the three least fair and reliable papers in the country. Who are the richest people in the world? There is something mythic about Otis story. He returned to California to attend Stanford, where he proved to be a world-class athlete (injury prevented him from going to the 1948 Olympics) and a high-flying fraternity brat. He grew up indulging his hobbies from weightlifting to big game hunting, and narrowly missing the 1952 Helsinki Olympics due to a wrist injury. His second wife, Bettina, is not particularly enthusiastic about his dangerous trips into the Great Beyond. We will continue to update information on Otis Chandlers parents. The scion of the wealthy Chandler family who took over the Los Angeles Times and transformed it into a nationally respected publication. First standards were set, then huge journalistic milestones were hit, and in the blink of an eye there was fiscal ruin, and a loss of ownership.What will we be left with? 2023 Forbes Media LLC. . So rich, complex and contentious is the Times saga that Jones and Catalena could have devoted an hour alone to the papers titanic political battle in 1934 against left-wing gubernatorial candidate and great American novelist Upton Sinclair. The concerts even became a family affair, as Wilde and her two kids were seated alongside Styles' mother, Anne Twist, at one of his performances in November 2021. I'd never known of Dorothy "Buff" Chandler's difficulty being accepted into the family, though I did know that she'd been successful in uniting Downtown and Westside [read Protestant and Jewish] philanthropists in building the Music Center downtown. The Burns influence on Jones and co-director Mark Catalena (who also lensed and edited) is most evident in the early sections, which lay out the rough-and-tumble life and times of the papers founder, Harrison Gray Otis (whose choice quotes are voiced by Hal Holbrook), a Civil War vet who grabbed the chance to run a minor paper in sleepy Los Angeles and turn it into a tool for real estate boosterism. Buffum's department stores were co-founded by his great-grandfather, former Mayor of Long Beach, California Charles Abel Buffum and great-grand uncle Edwin E. Buffum. They took the Los Angeles times from being a tool for real estate development to a Pulitzer Prize winning newspaper. Unionists explode dynamite at the Times Headquarters during. . The Times, owned by one family for almost its entire existence, did more than just cheer on this extraordinary transformation. Over his editors' objections, Boyarsky went ahead. The magazine was funded, in part, by the arena itself. Still, he sometimes feared that his passion for surfing would be remembered more than his accomplishments at the Times. He just wants to make it the best damned newspaper in the world -- and he'll want that until his dying day. [citation needed] Blond, blue-eyed, with craggy good looks and an athletes bearing, Otis was a pure vision of Southern California heroism. (He once confided to Tom Johnson, his handpicked successor as publisher: "Together, we are going to push the New York Times off its perch.") Newsweek once described him as the Midas of California. In addition to his role in the Owens Valley affair, Harry Chandler was directly or indirectly involved with the creation of the Coliseum, Olvera Street, the Salton Sea, the Biltmore Hotel, Douglas Aircraft, Chinatown, the Hollywood Bowl, the Ambassador Hotel, Hollywoodland (and therefore the Hollywood sign), Caltech, the Auto Club of Southern California and Santa Anita Race Track. Otis Chandler is part of the Silent Generation, which followed after the G.I. . Watching the Chandlers And Their Times was jarring, comforting, educational, enlightening and a cautionary tale. Otis Chandler's Geni Profile. I had toyed with the idea of asking him to arm-wrestle, because I knew that an angry Canadian musk ox had torn his right shoulder from its socket and impaired his upper-arm mobility. His mother insisted that he be sent East to boarding school to gain a proper education. After some back-and-forth polishing, Chandler asked Boyarsky to read the memo out loud in the newsroom. Reporters loved him. Capture a web page as it appears now for use as a trusted citation in the future. He was sure, though, that none of his five children was capable of succeeding him, so he named Tom Johnson to succeed him as publisher, and for the first time in nearly a century somebody other than a Chandler was running the Los Angeles Times. In his words, she was a power hungry matron-in-the-making who tried to control everyone around her. "I discovered my trust in a close friend was misplaced," Chandler told STANFORD in 1978. My guess is that all these reasons are true. This is the central mystery of his life. [1] Legacy edit] The community of Reseda, California, was originally named Marian, after Mrs. Chandler. Family and friends are welcome to send flowers or leave their condolences on this memorial page and share them with the family. A 10-foot-tall Kodiak bear ("October 1985; Record Size; Alaskan Peninsula"), paws and claws extended, looms behind Chandler's head. Genealogy for Otis Chandler (deceased) family tree on Geni, with over 245 million profiles of ancestors and living relatives. Otis war with unions is told here with hair-raising detail and archival materials. Perhaps no major newspaper in American history has experienced such dramatic swings in reputation and quality, all due to the whims of the rather bizarre clan that owned it. The way we read is going digital. The wall had come down; the journalism, by definition, lacked editorial integrity. ", The Otis Chandler era at the L.A. Times began on April 11, 1960, when his father introduced him as the new publisher. He was the fourth and final member of the Chandler family to hold the paper's top position. Frances C. Arrillaga Alumni Center Related to the above, I think Dune is excellent, and relevant. He was certainly a great newsman; in 1999, he was named one of the 25 most influential news people of the century by Editor & Publisher magazine. He also developed real estate and erected the famous Hollywood sign (which originally read "Hollywoodland") for one of his projects. (Both of Otis Chandler's parents also attended Stanford, and a grandson named Otis Chandler graduated from the Farm in June.). Chandler spent money to make money and was well rewarded. Otis Chandler was born in California. At the turn of the century, it was an Otis-Chandler syndicate that quietly purchased tens of thousands of acres of parched farmland in the San Fernando Valley, knowing that the fix was in to steal water rights from Owens Valley farmers 200 miles to the north. It goes all the way back to Harrison Otis and covers the dynasty through 2000. The central point is that the newspaper owner was in fact a visionary urban developer and epic capitalist, for whom the paper was a mere device for greater ends. Instead, his father greeted him with a seven-year executive training plan that would take him through every department of the paper. Made with great respect for entrepreneurs in Missoula, Montana. Furthermore, tensions started to surface within his extended family. 2020 ideamensch. Like a gargantuan 19th century novel, the saga of the Los Angeles Times is full of larger-than-life figures and historic sweep, betrayal and intrigue, pettiness and triumph. 326 Galvez Street Norman wanted to be a great man and a pillar of society, but he didn't quite have the inner fire to match that ambition. The first of their ten children, Stephen, was born June 1, 1784 in Norfolk. Obviously, as a Buffum descendant, I'm not entirely objective in the matter. But some explanation of the familys poor business decisions such as overthrowing management that had turned Times Mirror Corp. into a money machine and made the paper among the countrys best, and finally selling Times Mirror to Tribune Corp. would have buttressed the films themes. "I spent 50 years at the Los Angeles Times, plus going down there as a little kid when my dad would take me to see my grandfather. Times columnist Patt Morrison wrote: "It felt like I woke up and heard that the Pacific Ocean had been sold." He never got the full credit he deserved for having taken care of the family. In Silicon Valley we take it for granted that everyone has a smart phone now, but its not true nationally or globally yet. He hasn't killed a bear in at least a couple of years. When I started Goodreads, I bootstrapped it and for a year built it on the side while working half-time at my former job. My grandmother, Loreen Buffum Robinson, was Dorothy's cousin; from what I've been told, they were quite close when they were young. The paper had some habits that seem a little strange now. It doesn't sound so terrible today, but it was a big deal then.". Their strategy was aimed almost entirely at the short term, to prop up Times Mirror stock price and to increase the familys dividends. In political contests, the Times declined to cover the Democratic candidate; it let the liberal newspapers handle that chore. Five years later, Otis unexpectedly stepped down as chairman, and for many the golden age was over. Otis Chandler (1927-2006), Publisher of the Los Angeles Times (1960 and 1980) and great-grandson of Harrison Gray Otis Elwell Stephen Otis (1838-1909), United States of America General who served in the Philippines late in the Spanish-American War and during the Philippine-American War. In less than 100 years, Los Angeles went from a desert hamlet to one of the worlds two media capitals. Contact profile manager; View family tree; Problem with this page? But in fact, he keeps in close touch with his contacts at the paper and lives and breathes the daily vicissitudes of the Los Angeles Times. Please check back soon for updates. "[Chandler] was a great man who made this paper what it was. 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