The Washington Star - Final Years

Final Years

On February 2, 1978, Time Warner (then known as Time Inc.) purchased the Star for US$20 million. Their flagship magazine, Time, was archrival to Newsweek, which was published by The Washington Post Company, and the purchase seemed natural. Management issues continued to plague the publication, however. Editor-in-Chief Murray Gart, former chief of correspondents at Time, had no experience managing a newspaper and little experience even writing for one. An effort to draw readers with localized special "zonal" metro news sections did little to help circulation. The Star lacked the resources to produce the sort of ultra-local coverage zonal editions demanded and ended up running many of the same regional stories in all of its local sections. An economic downturn resulted in monthly losses of over US$1 million. On August 7, 1981, after 130 years, the Washington Star ceased publication. In the bankruptcy sale, the Post purchased the land and buildings owned by the Star, including its printing presses.

Many of the people who worked for the Star went to work for the newly formed The Washington Times which began operations shortly after the Star went out of business.

Writers who worked at the Star in its last days included Nick Adde (Army Times), Stephen Aug (ABC News), Michael Isikoff (Newsweek), Howard Kurtz (The Washington Post), Fred Hiatt (The Washington Post) Sheilah Kast (ABC News), Jane Mayer (The New Yorker), Chris Hanson (Columbia Journalism Review), Jeremiah O'Leary (The Washington Times), Chuck Conconi (Washingtonian), Crispin Sartwell (Creators Syndicate), Maureen Dowd (The New York Times), novelist Randy Sue Coburn, Michael DeMond Davis, Lance Gay, (Scripps Howard News Service):Jules Witcover (The Baltimore Sun), Jack Germond (The Baltimore Sun), Judy Bachrach (Vanity Fair), Lyle Denniston (The Baltimore Sun), Fred Barnes (Weekly Standard), Kate Sylvester (NPR, NBC, Governing Magazine) and Mary McGrory (The Washington Post).