Nevada Appeal at 150: Aug. 16, 1966: Newspaper with ties to Twain succumbs

New York (AP) — The New York Herald Tribune, former home of Mark Twain and heir to the journalist legacy of Horace Greeley and James Gordon Nennett, is dead.

The end of the Herald Tribune, which has not published for 115 days, was announced Monday by the World Journal Tribune Inc., the new publishing firm incorporating the Herald Tribune, the World-Telegram & Sun and the Journal-American.

Matt Meyer, president of the new company, said the publishers planned to go ahead with new afternoon and Sunday papers. Labor difficulties have kept all the planned new papers from being published since the merger was announced last April.

Meyer said the long delay has caused a loss of “talent in all creative departments of the Herald Tribune.”

The loss of the Herald Tribune left Manhattan with four major dailies, including the World Journal Tribune. The others are the morning New York Times and Daily News and the afternoon Post. Manhattan had six major dailies before the merger. Thirty-five years ago, there were 12.

Thus only the word Tribune on the new masthead remained of a journalist history that began with the penny-a-copy Herald of James Gordon Bennett in 1835. Six years later, Horace Greeley’s Tribune was born.

Separately, and later as the merged Herald Tribune, the papers were home to some of the greatest names of American journalism: Mark Twain, Richard Harding Davis, Henry J. Raymond and Charles A. Dana.

In modern times, the Herald Tribune’s columnists included Art Buchwald, John O’Hara, Walter Kerr, Walter Lippmann and Red Smith.

Meyers said the Herald Tribune’s end would mean a loss of 800 jobs.

Gov. Nelson A. Rockefeller said the state would set up special services to help Herald Tribune employees find new jobs.

This continues the Appeal’s review of news stories and headlines during its Sesquicentennial year.