Bernard Kilgore
News Organizations and Titles: 35 years at The Wall Street Journal--chairman of Dow Jones & Co., 1966-67; president, 1945-66; vice president and general manager, The Wall Street Journal, 1942-45; managing editor, 1941-42; bureau manager, Washington, 1935-41; editorial page columnist, 1932-35; reporter, copy editor, news editor, San Francisco, 1929-32.
Legacy: Mr. Kilgore is the visionary who made The Wall Street Journal into a national newspaper. Under his tutelage, the newspaper expanded its coverage, grew its circulation and extended its technology to deliver the same news and editorial content for readers no matter where they were in the United States. He increased Dow Jones' earnings from $211,201 in 1945 to more than $13 million in 1966. He made his mark as a young Washington reporter when FDR admonished reporters, befuddled by the economics of the new Social Security system, to "ask Kilgore." When he died, his photo was the first ever to run in the Journal.
Journalistic Progeny: Every Wall Street Journal reporter who followed Mr. Kilgore was tutored in his style of thinking and reporting. Even those who never worked for Dow Jones readily acknowledge that Mr. Kilgore changed the very face of business journalism.
Personal: Born Nov. 9, 1908, in Albany, Ind.; died Nov. 14, 1967, in Princeton, N.J. Member of the American Society of Newspaper Editors, Phi Gamma Delta, Phi Beta Kappa, Delta Sigma Rho, the International Press Institute, National Press Club and Gridiron.
Family: Married Mary Louise Throop Oct. 1, 1938. They had three children: Kathryn, James Bernard and John Harvey. James is publisher of The Princeton (N.J.) Packet Newspapers.
Awards:Founding member, Financial Journalism Hall of Fame, 1988; Sigma Delta Chi's Wells Memorial Key; Distinguished Service in Journalism Award, the University of Missouri; Hoosier of the Year, 1960; Fellow of Sigma Delta Chi; Indianapolis Front Page Award; Elijah Lovejoy Award, Colby College; Journalism Award, Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism; Distinguished Service to Journalism Award, Syracuse University; Journalism Achievement Award, University of Southern California School of Journalism.
Education: DePauw University, bachelor's degree in political science, 1929.
Home run stories or accomplishments: Mr. Kilgore wrote the first "What's News" column at 25 while working in the Washington bureau. He also started the "Washington Wire" feature of the paper. He was the architect behind The Wall Street Journal's Page One format. He oversaw the purchase of the Chicago Journal of Commerce and the technological expansion that allowed the same news and editorial edition of the paper to be printed in separate plants.
What he made news or headlines for: He launched the National Observer, a weekly national newspaper, on Feb. 4, 1962. In 1958, he established The Newspaper Fund, a program to encourage and develop better talent for journalism through summer internships and scholarships for students attending liberal arts colleges, and to provide summer workshops for high school teachers to learn about student publications. In 1955, he purchased The Princeton Packet, the oldest weekly newspaper in New Jersey.
What he has said about himself or his publication: To Journal Executive Editor Warren Phillips: "What is The Wall Street Journal anyhow? The most significant thing to me about it is that it is a newspaper and not a trade paper. It has more to do with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette than it does with Iron Age. It serves a community which is not geographic, except in a national sense, but includes so many different fields and interests and shapes and sizes that its community behaves more like a city than it does any occupation or interest."
About management: "The most important thing for top management to do is to make sure that anyone does not interfere with the news content of the paper."
What others have said about him: Edward E. Scharff in his book, "Worldly Power," wrote that Mr. Kilgore: "transcended the role of ordinary executive, becoming a kind of corporate saint. All of Dow Jones and Co.--from the Bancroft sisters, who owned it, to the lowliest janitors who swept the floors at night--basked in the shadow of Kilgore's genius." James W. Davant, managing partner of Paine, Webber, Jackson & Curtis and chairman of the board of the Association of Stock Exchange Firms: "Bernard Kilgore was a visionary who saw his dreams realized in his own lifetime.
Recognizing that information is vital to the marketplace, the securities industry owes a lasting debt to him for his pioneering efforts in the dissemination of business and financial news." Richard T. Baker, associate dean, Graduate School of Journalism, Columbia University: "A journalist with standards and taste. A helpful friend to his profession and a tremendous achiever. The phenomenal story of The Wall Street Journal in the past 25 years belongs to him." Warren H. Phillips, at the time chairman of Dow Jones & Company : "Nobody was writing those stories in those days. He didn't just revolutionize The Wall Street Journal, he revolutionized the newspaper business. Today we take it for granted when other newspapers write about currents in society that have nothing to do with what happened yesterday."
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