William Loeb III - Career

Career

Loeb partnered with his friend Charlie Weaver to buy the St. Albans Messenger in St. Albans, Vermont, in 1941 to enter the publishing arena. Loeb also received cash investments from a woman named Marka Loening, who indulged in an extramarital affair with Loeb while waiting for her divorce from her estranged husband to be finalized. Loeb later used funding from Loening to buy the Burlington Daily News in 1942. One of Loeb's first infamous journalistic exploits was the publishing of his own baptismal certificate on the front page of both Vermont papers in an attempt to disprove rumors of his Jewish ancestry.

Loeb cited ulcers for his medical exemption from service during World War II, allegedly drinking large quantities of alcohol before doctor's visits to ensure flare-ups.

In 1946, Loeb secured funding from Ridder Publications to buy the Manchester Union and the Evening Leader from Annie Reid Knox, the widow of former Navy Secretary William Franklin Knox. Mrs. Knox later regretted the sale, claiming she had not seen how Loeb handled his Vermont newspapers, and claiming that Loeb did not mention the involvement of the Ridder family. Loeb used $250,000 in funding from his mother's accounts to fund the purchase of his share in the papers, and later used an additional $300,000 to buy out other shareholders and gain complete control of the papers, which he then merged into the Union Leader.

In 1947, Loeb brought in investor Leonard Finder as a business partner in the paper. Marka Loening, increasingly resentful of the presence of Scripps-Howard heiress Elizabeth "Nackey" Scripps-Gallowhur in the newspaper offices, withdrew her interests in Loeb's papers that same year. Loeb's mother had been under the impression that he and Loening were to be married, but discovered upon Loening's departure that Loeb had been secretly married to Vermont resident Eleanore McAllister since 1942. Afterwards, Loeb publicly disclosed the marriage in his papers, but claimed it had taken place in 1947 and not 1942.

Meanwhile, new competition emerged in Manchester with the return of Bernard J. "B.J." McQuaid, a former Manchester Union reporter under the tenure of Colonel Knox, from military service in Europe. McQuaid founded a rival paper, The New Hampshire Sunday News, with his brother, Elias. Loeb quickly wooed Bernard McQuaid over to the Union Leader, and bought the Sunday News outright in 1948. With no other statewide media (radio signals being blocked by mountains, and other papers only local to their towns), Loeb essentially gained a media monopoly in the state for himself. He later bought a controlling interest in the television station WMUR.

Loeb's wife McAllister gave birth to a daughter, Katharine Penelope, on October 29, 1948.

In 1949, Loeb used the additional $300,000 from his mother and cash from various state politicians he endorsed to buy out Leonard Finder. Also in 1949, Loeb founded the Vermont Sunday News, largely a copy of the New Hampshire edition's content.

On August 5, 1949, Loeb took Nackey Gallowhur to meet his mother in New York City. There, George Gallowhur, Nackey's husband, attempted to serve her divorce papers. Loeb refused to permit Gallowhur's agents from serving her, and he was jailed briefly for interfering. Gallowhur sued Loeb for alienation of affection in accordance with an old Vermont law. Mrs. Loeb, infuriated at her son's mistreatment of Eleanore, excluded Bill from her will and sued him for the one million dollars in funding he obtained from her to finance his acquisitions of the Union Leader in 1946 and 1949.