So does her imperious carriage. Phil viewed this whole sequence of events, with some reason, as a violation of his rights and civil liberties. By contrast, the Wall Street Journals editorial page ignored Watergate and Iran-Contra as ideologically inconvenient and has pursued Whitewater with the foam visible on its lips. That. On Aug. 3, 1963, former Washington Post publisher Philip Graham, having struggled with severe bouts of depression for at least five years, went into the bathroom of his family farm near Marshall,. At one point, Mrs. Graham asked for ice cream. The Grahams ran their rather expensive household out of Katharines trust fund; meanwhile, Meyer gave Phil nearly three times as many shares of Post stock as he gave his daughter. Graham was born to a Lutheran family in Terry, South Dakota. Please reload the page and try again. This is, for me, the most painful thing to look back on. . Philip L. Graham. He operated on the theory that it was important to do with our four children only those things he himself enjoyed -- no dull board games, but hunting, fishing, walking. I see nothing wrong with the fact that people in power often deal with others on more than one level, she writes. The car, at least, was waiting and its driver was sober. I also think that he realized the illness would recur. If she has been cool to any Presidents since Watergate, they have been the two Democrats, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, not least because they came to town with the greatest suspicion of old-line WashingtonKatharine Grahams Washington. Women traditionally also have sufferedand many still dofrom an exaggerated desire to please, a syndrome so instilled in women of my generation that it inhibited my behavior for many years, and in ways still does. Everything except Phil's personal expenses was carried by me from the modest trust started for each of the Meyer children by my father. CAPTION: The Grahams with their children at Glen Welby in 1956; Lally, left, Katherine, Phil (holding Steve), Bill and Don. Early the next day, Phil and Larry in Paris both wrote letters to Stanton. On Aug. 3, having apparently made noticeable improvements, he convinced doctors to let him take a retreat to the Virginia farmhouse. Gravely, as if we were negotiating the Treaty of Ghent, I gave her an annotated copy of Vogue, a mug shot of Mrs. Graham, and a hundred dollars. When the plane landed in Washington, he was taken first to George Washington University Hospital and later to Chestnut Lodge, a private mental hospital in a suburb of Washington. When a young woman named Deborah Davis published a biography in 1979 called Katharine the Great, Mrs. Graham objected so strongly to its charges and innuendo that the chairman and president of Harcourt Brace, William Jovanovich, ordered the book withdrawn from stores and the inventory of more than twenty thousand copies reduced to pulp. When Eisenhower finally sent in federal troops, Phil saw it as a defeat not only for the South but for himself. Phil wasn't much better than I, but went at it with much more enthusiasm and natural energy -- so much so that at one of the parties his pants split horizontally across the rear. Phil received the larger share of the stock because, as Dad explained to me, no man should be in the position of working for his wife. On Nov. 2, I flew up to Idlewild Airport with Phil to see him off to Europe, where he was going to talk to Larry Norstad. To this day, I cannot say what the beast wasa leopard, a cougar, a jaguarbut I can still see its talons not an inch from the hose and flesh of my proprietor. Katharine, born in New York in 1917, was baptized when she was ten to satisfy the Lutheran side of the family; to satisfy the demands of class, the Meyers had their own pew at St. Johns Episcopal Church, on Lafayette Squarethe presidents church (Katharine did not seem to realize she was part Jewish until she was at Vassar.) The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Cond Nast. Philip Graham was publisher and later co-owner of The Washington Post. And I was incredulous -- this brilliant, charismatic, fascinating man loved me! ", Early Thursday morning, Kennedy called Johnson, waking him up and making an appointment to see him a little later. Curie. In my boyhood as a reporter, I nearly killed the matriarch of the liberal-media conspiracy. Dr. Phil and Wife Robin Live in a Sprawling Mansion! Phil's involvement in the whole matter -- besides pushing Lyndon on its importance from the beginning of their relationship -- began in earnest in July, when he invited {civil rights lawyer} Joe Rauh to our farm in Virginia, Glen Welby. Under Phil Graham, the Post had a well-respected editorial page and mediocrity nearly everywhere else; it was not even the best paper in the city. I hadnt realized that the Post wasnt perfectly okay.). Into this vacuum, Phil moved swiftly and with great assurance. Phil would be publisher in title and in fact. This being Russia, however, I could not bet with any confidence against the possibility that he was at this very moment converting his cash into a refreshing liquidity at some local bote. A South Dakota native, Philip Graham graduated from Harvard Law School and worked as a clerk to two Supreme Court justices. We went to a restaurant, had a long dinner, talked and laughed a lot, and drank until quite late. "We have worked out this solution: we'll live in the sort of house, have the sort of furniture, eat the sort of food, go to the sort of places, that young people making salaries like mine can afford.". Gradually, I became the drudge and, whats more, accepted my role as a kind of second-class citizen. She once took the time to introduce her friend the architect I. M. Pei to Agnes. That was some circus! We were both up all night, with me trying desperately but to no avail to be of some reassuring help. I would be recalled to the home office. Born: 18-Jul-1915 Birthplace: Terry, SD Died: 3-Aug-1963 Location of death: Marshall, VA Cause of death: Suicide . Needless to say, for years I regaled all who would listen with my Katharine Graham story. But then Mrs. Graham was laughing. See Photos. the tiny fringe of arrogant litists who infect the healthy mainstream of American journalism with their own peculiar view of the world. The fact is, though, that two days after making that statement Colson talked to Howard Hunt about the need to supply more financial help to the defendants in the Watergate trial. Grahams insecurity as a woman, as a publisher, and as a parent has clear and painful origins. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. At once he became my father's close collaborator. For whatever reason, I liked to be dominated and to be the implementer. Or purchase a subscription for unlimited access to real news you can count on. Sometimes you dont really decide, you just move forward, and that is what I didmoved forward blindly and mindlessly into a new and unknown life. Then Mrs. Graham started past it. Money, my fathers being Jewish, and sex were taboo subjects at home. He counterbalanced my ingrown resistance to new and different ideas, and to people with whom I didn't agree politically. But, always, it was he who decided and I who responded. Bradlee was incensed, and said so in terms both loud and profane. It was incredibly exciting. Felix adopted Phil as one of his "boys" before he was appointed by President Roosevelt to the Supreme Court. He does not travel the globe to interview foreign leaders. . Profile. I had to face facts -- Phil was really gone. My father had said that he himself was too old to let Phil work his way up. On Aug. 3, 1963, former Washington Post publisher Philip Graham, having struggled with severe bouts of depression for at least five years, went into the bathroom of his family farm near Marshall, Va., and committed suicide with a 28-gauge shotgun. Facebook gives people the power to. In speeches, Dole had accused her paper of waging an ideological vendetta against the President. For her part, Katharine would go on to helm the Post, becoming its de facto publisher during the famed Watergate era and, in 1979, becoming the first woman to hold the title officially. As he emerged more on the journalistic and political scenes, I increasingly saw my role as the tail to his kiteand the more I felt overshadowed, the more it became a reality. Phil Graham began referring to his wife, who by 1952 had given birth to four children, as Porky; to heighten the joke, he gave her as a present a French butcher-shop head of a pig. He came to Washington in 1917 as a dollar-a-year man for the Wilson Administration; and, while he was holding a variety of positions on the War Industries Board, the Farm Loan Board, and the Federal Reserve Board, the Meyers became friendly with Bernard Baruch, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Charles Evans Hughes. The paper sent out a young reporter named Ben Bradlee to cover what was happening, but Bradlee could barely find his story in the paper: it was buried deep inside, and nearly all mention of race and violence had been excised. The year leading up to Grahams death was a turbulent one for him and his family. You are stuck with me as a mascot repeat mascot. community.". Phil Graham's descent into the abyss of manic depression accelerated, and on 24 December 1962 she discovered that he was embroiled in an affair with a Newsweek stringer, Robin Webb. Phil called me once or twice, and carried on in his usual irreverent, breezy way. Weymouth's brother, Stephen Graham,. Graham instructed Bradlee to recount what he had seen and heard, and after he had done so the publisher and the three officials worked out a deal: as long as all the city pools were shut down for the time being and would be integrated the following year, the paper would print nothing more of what had happened. Robin, who is a philanthropist, entrepreneur, and best-selling author, opened up about their marriage on her husband's podcast, "Phil in the Blanks." "We don't have the perfect marriage," she admitted. There is still a vital distinction. . As far as I know, Katharine Graham had not written much since her early days on the Post, when she wrote a magazine column and was the anonymous author of such editorials as On Being a Horse, Mixed Drinks, and Spotted Fever. And yet I dont know of a more complex autobiography by an American business figure, certainly not one that allows itself such moments of weakness, embarrassment, and pain. with that of the increasingly powerful conservative media (the Journal editorial page, the Weekly Standard, The American Spectator, etc. He committed suicide that day. The editors around her grumbled almost inaudibly, but just enough, it seemed to me, to nudge her out of such a call. Not long after Phil left her, Katharine sent him a desperate telegram: Mascots are for loving helping and listening. I did not go to help you. There is plenty of material in Personal History to satisfy the most obvious expectationsall the familiar episodes of the Posts history are replayed, and famous faces bob into sight as if in a capital version of Grand Hotelbut more interesting is the degree to which this memoir is a description of the muggy intimacy of the world of Washington and the way one powerful woman learned to live her life there. On a second trip in December, Graham described Webb on his official schedule as "Newsweek reporter and temporary personal shopper, tour director, and femme de chambre for our group." On July 5, Johnson held a press conference at which he announced his candidacy. Phil remained loyal to Johnson until he lost the bid for the nomination. Meyer began his financial career by investing six hundred dollars his father had given him for not smoking until he was twenty-one. Johnson worked actively to cultivate the press, and Phil was always drawn to politics. If you have the goods, you say, Screw it, and publish. I cannot tell you how pained I am by the circumstances which have caused you, quite unnecessarily, distress and concern, Jovanovich wrote in a cowering letter to Mrs. Graham. But, if he does, the decisions should not be as hard for him as they were for Katharine Graham. At one meeting with L.B.J. But he always insisted that we lead our own lives. Graham heard him. If there are any smart literary agents around these days, one of them will copyright the title The Breaking of the President, the piece said, for it is becoming more obvious with every passing day that the men and the movement that broke Lyndon B. Johnsons authority in 1968 are out to break Richard M. Nixon in 1969.. I grew up considerably, mostly thanks to him. ), Graham had undeniably, historically, made the right decision, and in the years to come she supported the investigative efforts of the Post; but the signs of her ambivalence about her social and political role never ceased. View the profiles of people named Robin Graham. John Ehrlichman, Ronald Ziegler, H. R. Haldeman, and Nixon himself all charged the Post with disloyalty. friends for the Aegean cruise. Under Ochs, the Times institutionalized the notion of nonpartisan, objective reporting. Great risk was involved, or so one heard. He remained seriously depressed but seemed to me to be quite noticeably better, even after only a week or so at Chestnut Lodge. Tenants in Rent-Controlled Units Could See as Much as 8.9 Percent Increases, The Cranky Redskins Fans Guide to Dan Snyder. Yet, with all her complexity, I felt closer throughout my early childhood to my mother than to the very distant and rather difficult figure of my father. It was a loyal nanny, Powelly, who supplied the hugs, the comforting, the feeling of human contact, even the love that my mother did not.. . On an early trip, he requested a secretary, and the bureau chief dispatched Robin Webb, a young Australian trying to make it as a journalist. Post vice president James Truitt arranged with Kennedy to send Air Force 2 to retrieve Graham, who checked in for the first of two brief stays at Chestnut Lodge, then a leading psychiatric hospital in Rockville, Md., that has since burned down. I told her that this woman, this very important woman, was gravely ill and in need of immediate medical attention. Why are Vladimir Putins opponents dying? I think he felt he'd done such harm the last time around that he just couldn't deal with it, couldn't fix everything. My father received a confidential letter from his friend Kent Cooper, former general manager of the Associated Press, who was living in retirement in Palm Beach. See Photos. Terms & Conditions See Photos Inside His Beverly Hills Home. . Mrs. Grahamone always referred to her as Mrs. Graham, even in private and at great distancesdid not travel in the style of the British Raj, but she was not arriving on a Eurailpass, either. He said he felt trapped, no longer able to go on; that everything was black. It's hard to describe my devastation after my discovery of the affair. I passed the box without incident. Despite his early apprehensions about my father's wealth, politics, and possible impulse to control, Phil gradually grew very close to him. 1952) Mistress: Robin Webb (Newsweek journalist, 1962) High School: Miami High School, Miami, FL To revisit this article, select My Account, thenView saved stories, To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories. For example, what I could not have known at the Hermitage is that after the suicide of her husband, on August 3, 1963, and the funeral, Mrs. Graham sent her eldest son, Donald, back to his internship at the Times, sent her two younger sons, Bill and Steve, back to summer camp, and promptly flew off to Europe to meet her eldest childher daughter, Lallyand a group of very O.K. I think my behavior was a combination of a rational ideathat it was better to be talking to people who hated us or disapproved of us than notand that good old-fashioned encumbrance of mine, the desire to please., Not long after Watergate, she worried about over-involvement and a newspapers need to guard against the romantic tendency to picture itself in the role of a heroic and beleaguered champion, defending virtues against overwhelming odds. Watergate, she writes, had been an aberration, and I felt we couldnt look everywhere for conspiracies and cover-ups.. Grahams mentor, Felix Frankfurter, talked him out of firing Barth, but Graham did print an apologetic note in the paper undermining the original editorial. . Soccer Name variations: Kay Graham; Mrs. Phil Graham; Katharine Meyer. Gone not to my Far Country but to my Destiny. Dr. Phil McGraw has worked extremely hard over the years . He is a Jew, a Republican, and rich as hell. There, in a ballroom full of the nation's top publishers, Phil Graham lost it. Beer He was a clerk for Supreme Court Justice Stanley Reed while waiting to clerk the following year for Felix Frankfurter, his mentor from Harvard Law School. {But a fight was unnecessary. It was all kept very private; our one idea was to conceal what had happened not only from the world but from our friends, my family, and even our children. The moment of happiness you gave me is more help than most people are given in a lifetime, Thank you for it. Both Phil and Felix worked on Joe throughout our dinner, suggesting that the most important first step for the 1950s was the right to vote. If there was one journalist she admired more than any other, it was her friend James Reston, and it was Reston who, despite his many virtues, had famously said, I will not have the New York Times muckraking the President of the United States. But in the end she made her decision. I would be lucky to cover high-school softball in Prince William County. {Rauh favored a much broader civil rights bill, but the Senate had watered it down.} See Photos. Events: A heads up about City Paper events, from panels to parties. Facebook. Openings It was featured, with a photograph, in the next days edition of Pravda. Email or phone: Password: . The legends of correspondents and their varying abilities to cope with a royal visit were countless. To win the paper, Phil employed the most feared lawyer in Washington, Edward Bennett Williams. During the 1988 visit to Moscow, I remember, Mrs. Graham said that perhaps she ought to telephone Nancy and tell her about the lengths that the Kremlin was going to in preparing for an imminent summit. The truth is that I adored him and saw only the positive side of what he was doing for me. But by the summer of 1958, he was starting to do a little more. Robin Webb was raised in England, UK. When I opened the door to a downstairs bathroom, I found him. Phil's activities in regard to Little Rock were the first sign for me that something was wrong with him, that his powerful talents could be used in such an idealistic but confusing and irrational way. She writes this vacuum, Phil employed the most painful thing to look back on bathroom. Waiting and its driver was sober media ( the Journal editorial page, the decisions should not be as for..., accepted my role as a woman, as a clerk to two Supreme Court justices most lawyer. 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