That article deeply wounded some of the 160-odd descendants of Otis grandfather, family patriarch Harry Chandler. She was athletic, she surfed, she hunted and she was always vying for equal status or greater status than Otis, said Howard Gilmore, one of Chandlers longtime hunting companions. The Dowling Family Tree with over half a million relatives,contains thousands of pictures and over four thousand GeneaStars.We are all related! I never understood how he could just opt out like that., But Chandler, asked often about his decision to leave, said: I gave 40 years of my life to The Times and Times Mirror. He set his sights on a goal making The Times one of the two or three great American papers and he pulled it off.. He was rejected anyway; his shoulders and hips were still too big to fit into the cockpit of a jet. But former Editor Thomas, who joined the paper two years after Otis became publisher, said that although Chandler was basically a C-plus student his focus and tenacity made him an A-plus as a publisher or almost anything else he really put his mind to., (Jesus, Bill, Chandler told Thomas when he learned what the editor had said. [1], "Oats" was Chandler's nickname within the family. [1] He was the son of Norman Chandler, his predecessor as publisher, and Dorothy Buffum Chandler, a patron of the arts and a Regent of the University of California. He always has to have a project. The stories described the Birchers extremist tactics and positions and, largely through their own words, depicted them as a threat to, rather than a defender of, the American way of life. I thought Otis was committed in the same way, she said. I dont butt in.. Otis and Williams perhaps the ablest newspaper editor of his generation, in Halberstams words became a formidable team. [1], On a 1964 safari in Mozambique, an elephant charged his party. He expected the very best of himself and of those around him.. Many at The Times hoped that in the aftermath of that re-emergence, Chandler would use his moral authority to help reverse what he and they saw as the declining fortunes of the paper. Chandler always denied any conflict of interest, and he invariably emerged from these controversies with his reputation for personal integrity intact. Shaw, The Times longtime media critic, filed a draft of this obituary before his death Aug. 1. Various Chandlers controlled about 65% of the Times Mirror voting stock before the sale to Tribune in 2000, and most of them love Willes, Otis said several months before those negotiations began. He said I had to be well-rounded and implied that it was so I could ultimately take some executive position. Chandler and his editor, Williams, lured reporters away from the Wall Street Journal, the New York Daily News, the Washington Star, BusinessWeek and U.S. News & World Report. With Otis gone, the heat shield was gone, Johnson said. As it turned out, however, several members of the Chandler family had begun to share Otis disenchantment with Willes, especially the companys lack of diversification, interest in new media and long-term strategic plan, as Chandlers sister, Camilla Chandler Frost, put it the morning the sale to Tribune was announced. Sure enough, both Thomas and Johnson said that after Chandler left, they were pressured by the sixth floor, where Times Mirror corporate offices were, to fire Day, whom Erburu and many in the family and on the board regarded as too liberal. He saw them both as restraints on his freedom. Many had led quietly productive lives outside the newspaper industry and had tried to keep their complaints about cousin Otis and The Times within the family circle. He was particularly resentful of Willes frequent promise to reinvent the newspaper and Willes and Downings unwillingness to consult him. Unlike his father, however, he had not insisted that his children follow him into leadership positions at The Times. My style was to do the job and push the boundaries, and once Otis realized I knew what I was doing, he let me do it, Thomas said. By his own count, Chandler had at least half a dozen brushes with death over the years, and that didnt include his bout with prostate cancer in 1989 or his mild heart attack in 1998. Chandler later praised his editor for frequently reminding a young publisher that you cant change a whole paper overnight.. He lifted weights three times a week in his home gym. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. He was turned down because he was 17 pounds heavier than the maximum allowed for jet pilots, so he starved himself and quickly lost the weight. If a newspaper, even a great newspaper like the Los Angeles Times, loses credibility with its community, with its readers, with its advertisers, with its shareholders, that is probably the most serious circumstance that I can possibly envision. After a year or so in editorial, when I told my dad that Id just like to be a reporter, he said, no, I had to go on to other departments, Chandler said. Then, on April 11, 1960, Norman Chandler invited more than 700 people to a luncheon at the Biltmore Bowl ballroom in downtown Los Angeles, where he promised a special announcement.. I loved being a reporter. The night he arrived home, his young familys possessions crammed into a used station wagon and rented trailer, his mother and father welcomed him enthusiastically. He started work right away as a pressroom apprentice on the graveyard shift. When Burke asked Chandler if hed like to invest in his company and introduce Burke to other potential investors among the publishers wealthy friends Chandler was happy to comply. He wrote a statement, dictated it to Bill Boyarsky, then city editor, and asked that it be read aloud to the newsroom staff. Chandler was the great-grandson of Gen. Harrison Gray Otis, the blustery Civil War veteran who bought part-ownership of The Times in 1882, a year after it began publication, and was its publisher for 35 years. He collected vintage cars and drove most of them to work at one time or another, alternating Porsches and Rolls-Royces with motorcycles, pickups and other vehicles in his growing inventory. Bureaus opened in Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro, Mexico City, Hong Kong, Rome, Bonn, London, Vienna and San Francisco, at the United Nations and on Wall Street. It was clear to me that it meant a lot to him and that he didnt want to feel shut out.. When Chandler left the publishers office and again when he left the chairmans job, his former colleagues worried that without him, they would no longer be immune to corporate and outside pressures. Nearly a decade after his divorce, he installed the best of his animals in dioramas amid the classic cars and motorcycles in his Oxnard museum. Soon there was talk of Otis becoming publisher of the Mirror when he finished his training program most likely as one of the final steps before he became publisher of The Times. Surely, Chandler was the only publisher of his or any generation to have been profiled not only in Time, Newsweek and Editor & Publisher but in such magazines as Road & Track, Strength and Health, and Safari Club and to be depicted on the cover of the Atlantic Monthly in his bathing suit, riding a surfboard made of newspapers through the curl of a massive whitecap of dollar bills. The Chandlers had no rival as the most powerful family in Southern California. [1], In 1966 Chandler received the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award as well as an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Colby College. Otis enthusiastically supported Michael's racing career until a near-fatal crash while qualifying at Indianapolis in 1984. Chandler liked the shotput and weightlifting, he once said, because they were individual sports, and he could be judged on his own merits. [2] In 1945, her husband became publisher of the Times, a position he held until he was succeeded by their son, Otis, in 1960. Constance Chandler 1896-1962. Only then did Chandler tell Thomas about himself and his family. Norman Chandler died in 1973. Two years later, he was considered a cinch to be one of three shotputters on the U.S. team for the Olympic Games in Helsinki, but he sprained his wrist before the tryouts and had to pull out the biggest disappointment of my life, he recalled almost 50 years later. To grasp the breadth of the changes, it is necessary to understand what The Times had been. He was the fourth and final member of the Chandler family to hold the paper's top position. According to official documents, he wrote and telephoned a number of such people, including Evelle Younger, the former state attorney general and Los Angeles County district attorney. Research genealogy for Otis Chandler of Duxbury, Plymouth, Massachusetts, United States, as well as other members of the Chandler family, on Ancestry. Chandler changed The Times so dramatically and became so identified with the paper that when he left the publishers office at age 52, and again when he relinquished his corporate titles five years later, employees at The Times and Chandlers peers throughout the industry were both stunned and puzzled. We treated him as an insider and told him what was happening, Carroll said. In October 1999, The Times published a special issue of its Sunday magazine devoted entirely to Staples Center, the sports arena and entertainment venue then about to open in downtown Los Angeles. Former Times publisher Tom Johnson, left, greets Otis Chandler at a USC Annenberg Distinguished Achievement Awards dinner in January 2000. Numerous top Times reporters left the paper, many to join the New York Times or to pursue other interests. The collection also included dozens of vintage motorcycles, some of which were loaned to the Guggenheim Museum for its Art of the Motorcycle exhibit, which opened in 1998. His efforts led him directly into confrontation with a powerful force for the status quo: his own family. Prep Rally is devoted to the SoCal high school sports experience, bringing you scores, stories and a behind-the-scenes look at what makes prep sports so popular. But the newsroom was riddled with hacks, and Norman Chandler was unwilling to make sweeping personnel changes or to approve the expenditures necessary to effect significant improvement. The Mirror was losing $30,000 a week, and Otis sent his father a confidential memo urging that a strong business manager be hired. A year later, he moved again. In a controversial 1996 story in Vanity Fair, Chandler was quoted as criticizing his relatives as coupon clippers elitists bored with the problems of AIDS and the homeless and drive-by shootings. They wished The Times wouldnt cover those issues, and they werent interested in either the papers editorial quality or its social responsibility, he said. He said to me many times that he hadnt wanted to come to the paper in the first place, but he felt an obligation to his family to do it, said Robert F. Erburu, who succeeded Chandler as Times Mirror chairman. He was also so disenchanted with the management of Times Mirror by then that, to the dismay of many, he not only didnt fight or even criticize the sale but instead embraced it as a very positive move a perfect fit a win-win situation.. "I was raised to hate the unions," Chandler said. Doctors estimated that his dislocated right arm would never fully heal, but, citing a disciplined training regimen, Chandler claimed to regain virtually all use. His two predecessors as chairman his father and Murphy had been invited to remain on the board, in a non-voting capacity, after their 70th birthdays, but Chandler was not extended a similar invitation, and he was clearly hurt by that. He died in 2002. But in 1968, the paper endorsed Democrat Alan Cranston for U.S. Senate over Republican Max Rafferty, whom it called an outspoken, militant conservative.. Many invested with Burke, who raised more than $30 million among 2,200 individuals over eight years. Chandler himself invested more than $200,000 of his personal funds. His father, publisher of The Times from 1944 to 1960, had worked in the fields of the familys Tejon Ranch when he was a boy, so he saw no reason to spare his son from physical labor or spoil him with money. Chandler was an exotic, at times mythic figure among the nations newspaper executives, most of whose exertions and excursions outside the boardroom were generally limited to golf courses and cruise ships. They asked me a lot of questions and made me feel welcome again, Chandler said a few days later. 2443 E Peach Tree Drive, Chandler, AZ 85249 (MLS# 6525796) is a Single Family property with 3 bedrooms and 2 full bathrooms. For the first time in five years, I felt like I wasnt a leper. As long as I knew him, Otis had an adventurous spirit and the courage to pursue it.. There Chandler spent much of his time alone, later in life unable to name a single childhood friend. But after about 18 months, I accepted an invitation to his house for dinner, and when I drove up to this huge mansion in San Marino, I thought, Holy cow! When I got inside, I said, Well, just what do you do at The Times?.. He was bold in making changes and investments in the paper that transformed The Times into a world-class news organization., Otis was a giant in every way, said Donald Graham, chief executive officer and chairman of the board of the Washington Post Co. The paper you are reading is his monument. For the first time in his life, he found his personal integrity seriously questioned. Like his father, he was a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity (Sigma Rho chapter). He hunted. This coincided with the shift of the paper's editorial stance from overtly conservative to independent. Although Halberstam would later say, No single family dominates any other region of this country as the Chandlers have dominated California, Otis had a far-from-pampered upbringing and was never a man who could be described as effete. As it happened, the consultants also recommended that, to ensure stability, the new publisher be capable of holding the job at least 15 years. But he did send memos to Williams, the editor, periodically in his early years as publisher criticizing the business and sports sections, for example, and complaining about the content and design of the Sunday magazine, then as now called West. Chandler retired as publisher in 1980 at the age of 52 to become chairman of Times Mirror, reducing his involvement in the day-to-day operations of the company. So did the shutdown in January 1962 of the Mirror and the Examiner, the morning Hearst newspaper. Sure, like any business executive, there were times when I would like to have been away from it all, free of responsibilities. A public memorial will be held Monday at All Saints Church in Pasadena. Norman, the eldest, went through an executive training program and rose to be composing superintendent a position overseeing much of the physical production of the paper before leaving in 1989, when he was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor. Mrs. Chandler later achieved fame on her own by raising almost $20 million to finance the creation of the Music Center, a step that went a long way toward erasing the hick town image that Otis had long resented, and she was always keenly interested in the papers coverage of culture and society. Doctors said his right arm, yanked from its socket by the impact, would be virtually useless for the rest of his life. Going with newspapers only is a flawed strategy, a dangerous philosophy that puts The Times at risk. I was strictly a tall, skinny blond kid from California.. Thomas, who was among the editors brought over from the Mirror, said he believed that the windfall of local talent was as responsible for The Times subsequent success as the hiring of big guns from the East. Chandler started prep school at Cate, in Carpinteria, but his parents thought hed find a greater challenge and broader perspective back East, so after a year they transferred him to Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass. Perelman once wrote that while traveling through the western United States by train, he asked a porter to bring him a newspaper and unfortunately, the poor man, hard of hearing, brought me the Los Angeles Times.. Most of his early jobs in the training program were just that jobs, a grinding routine, he later said and because his father wanted him to have as many Times experiences (and meet as many Times employees) as possible, his schedule was constantly changing. They owned vast landholdings and used their influence with elected officials and the business elite to shape the regions development. He gradually worked his way through every department at the paper: production, circulation, the mailroom, mechanical, advertising, the newsroom. His son was perfectly willing, indeed eager, to do and spend whatever was necessary to achieve journalistic respectability. In one of their biggest coups, they brought in Robert J. Donovan, the Washington Bureau chief of the New York Herald-Tribune and one of the most respected journalists in the country, to be chief of the expanded Times bureau in the capital. As a boy, he would stand alongside his father and grandfather at Hollywood Cemetery (now Hollywood Forever) in annual memorials to the victims of a bomb blast that wrecked the Times building in 1910, killing 20 workers. "No publisher in America improved a paper so quickly on so grand a scale, took a paper that was marginal in qualities and brought it to excellence as Otis Chandler did," journalist David Halberstam wrote in his history of the company.[1]. Their first child was a boy named Norman after Chandler's father. Many people found him a bit distant cool, controlled, difficult to know well and these qualities became more pronounced as he matured and increasingly tried to escape the burden of being a Chandler. Connect to 5,000+ Chandler profiles on Geni, Norman Chandler, Dorothy Chandler (born Buffum), Cause of death: Motor neuron disease, Dementia with Lewy bodies - Feb 27 2006 - Ojai, 1930 - Los Angeles (Districts 0001-0250), Los Angeles, California, USA, 1940 - 800 West Orange Grove, Arcadia, Manrovia Township, Los Angeles, California, USA, June 18 1951 - Los Angeles, California, United States, Feb 27 2006 - Meiners Oaks, Ventura, California, United States, Nov 23 1927 - Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States, Norman Chandler, Dorothy Chandler (geb. In 1948 the Chandler family had started a second newspaper, an afternoon tabloid called the Los Angeles Mirror, and as part of his training program, Otis worked there too. They wanted the U.S. to withdraw from the United Nations. Other key members of the Chandler family wanted Philip to succeed Norman, wrote Marshall Berges in his 1984 book, The Life and Times of Los Angeles. But Norman regarded Philip as something of a lightweight, not entirely competent to take an aggressive leadership role at The Times.. Unbeknown to the reporters and editors who worked on that project and to the entire editorial staff of The Times the paper had agreed to share the profits from the issue with Staples Center as part of a complicated arrangement by which The Times became a founding partner of the arena. Although Chandler had previously been insistent that his criticisms of the business strategies pursued by Times management remain private, this undermining of the papers editorial integrity stirred him to action. He had purchased his first a 1931 Duesenberg in 1968 for $35,000, and he built a world-class collection of Porsches, Ferraris, Duesenbergs, Cadillacs, Packards and other classics before selling all of them to meet the financial terms of his divorce settlement. Times had been did the shutdown in January 2000 an insider and told him what was,. 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