Tabloid Nation Seminar Paper
Part 2
“Dead.” This was the headline from the January 13th 1928 edition of The New York Daily News. This one headline referred to the first execution by electric chair of “ The Bloody Blonde”, Ruth Snyder. This headline and the image of the electrocuted, rotting corpse of Snyder increased the circulation of the paper by over 300,000. The headline was the inspiration for Harry Guy Bartholomew to reinvent his struggling Daily Mirror by adopting the “New York-style tabloid”, which he felt was “capable of selling perhaps ten times as many copies.”
After seizing control of the Mirror from the conservative board of directors in 1934, he envisioned a paper where “Sensationalism” would be the main selling point of the newspaper with shocking headlines and sexual arousing pictures to sell alongside them. “Bart” hired J Walter Thompson; an American advertising mogul who concluded the re-launch would focus on “human interest” stories and an expanded features section.
With this idea, off his own back he hired Basil D Nicholson as the new features editor of The Mirror. Nicholson was famous for being an advertising genius whose phrases had the ability to change the thought process of a mass society into thinking something. This approach would be adopted in his features writing where he insured that every story had two important elements:
1. Think of a headline-the newspaper equivalent of an ad slogan.
And
2. Write some “tosh”, which is another way to explain to “stand it up.”
This has remained the same in Journalism even today where whenever you have an idea for a story or interview you need to ensure you have the pictures and the quotes to stand it up.
These ideas did bring upon by 1936, a page and a half on comic strips, which proved to be an important entity within the paper’s core structure. However, a clash of personalities between Nicholson and Bart and one slip of the tongue to many led to the eventful dismissal of Nicholson and he was to be replaced by Hugh Cudlipp who would turn out to be the major benefactor in all of this hostility.
Cudlipp was part of a family dynasty of Journalists with his three brothers all becoming journalists, including his brother Reg who would become the editor of The News of the World. An early experience of near death and unemployment scared Cudlipp to ensure he was always employed and financially stable.
In 1935 at the age of 22 Hugh Cudlipp took over the reigns as features editor and under Bartholomew’s instruction led the rival of stories derived from human interests and labelled “shock-horror” in their realism, without a moments thought to how the story would be received.
Cudlipp did introduce a column where reader could write in and get their questions answered. He ensured that every letter was personally answered and this was starting to obtain The Mirror a new female audience. This was taking advantage of where the paper would support the rights of females to the point where it strived to improve the working conditions of secretaries, this becoming one of the many examples of “Investigative Journalism.” This would be the vocal drive of the features section, which would appeal to a women’s every need, but would also be used as a ploy for Cudlipp and Bart to continue to “sex” up the paper by any means, including the first example of “Page Three.”
Cudlipp would go behind Bartholomew’s back in 1938 when he became the editor of The Sunday Pictorial. This decision enraged Bart, but Hugh Cudlipp would take the paper and sensationalise it further than he had at The Mirror and the circulation increased at a much faster rate.
With World War Two looming and the reign of terror of Hitler’s Nazi party growing every stronger, Cudlipp spoke out against Hitler and used his paper to voice his view on how he felt the nation needed to stand up for themselves against this superpower. He praised Hitler for curbing Germany unemployment, but this was used as a tactic to cause Britain to “deeply resent” Hitler. He was able to along with his superior Cecil King convince Winston Churchill to organise a large Army, Air Force and Navy ready to attack Germany head-on.
Hugh Cudlipp was conscripted into the Army at the start of the war, but this lead The Mirror into a period of severe controversy. The paper at the start of the war were the only paper who appeased other views who felt Britain should side with Hitler, but The Mirror would start to voice opinion, which lead to the resignation of Neville Chamberlain and the employment of Churchill as Prime Minister.
However, the stance of The Daily Mirror, which supported the solders on the front line and belittled the officers and the government took a step too far when in March 1942 when a cartoon showing a merchant solider clinging onto driftwood after an Nazi attack on his ship. The British Government and secret service felt this was a Nazi propaganda symbol and felt The Daily Mirror was working for Hitler against the British.
In reality this was not the case as the paper was just trying to show the war from its true reality. The frontline. Cudlipp had his own paper whilst on the frontline called Union Jack, which deployed similar articles and features found in The Mirror. He was commended for this and was awarded an OBE an honorary Lieutenant Colonel.
As the war ended, the key figurehead of the old school, gentleman of the conservative Mirror board of directors John Cowley died and Bart had been appointed Chairman. Cudlipp who was among a string of Mirror columnist who had reported from the frontline and sent their stories back to Britain and published under secret alias were to be commended and promoted in a time Cecil King felt “That is that we are all going places!”
In 1945 after persuasion by Labour party followers, The Mirror released the headline saying simply “VOTE FOR HIM. “This slogan enabled a Labour victory and showed how one newspaper could have so much influence and cause a political outcome, which no one had expected. This change helped Britain create the welfare state, education reform, social security and The NHS, which has helped the country grow and establish more equality and gave more opportunities to working-class people, which before then had been very limited.
Conflict between Cudlipp and Bart erupted, which led to Cudlipp drunken outburst against Bart at the 1948 Mirror Christmas party and this led to Cudlipp instant dismissal. However, The Daily Mirror rival, The Daily Express, which was run by Lord Beaverbrook, employed him almost instantly.
However, inside The Daily Mirror Cecil King was planning a revolt against Henry Guy Bartholomew and in December 1951 conspired and convinced every member of the Mirror board, including close associates of Bart that he should be removed as chairman. This was to be the end of the Harry Guy Bartholomew and Cecil King would now take reign and would bring Hugh Cudlipp back to fold.
Part 3
Cudlipp was brought back and made editor-in-chief of both The Daily Mirror and The Sunday Pictorial. The Mirror continued to diminish The Daily Express in terms of sales, but was facing a losing battle in the advertising, as The Express would aim its advert at the middle class, whilst The Mirror targeted the working class.
The Mirror would have to change it’s aims and news agenda to meet it’s targeted demographic of the “babybloomers” and Cudlipp tried to build The Mirror as a “modern day” Express and felt it was time he allowed the paper to “Spread it’s wings.”
To do this he hired more university graduates and women to try give the paper more greater depth and knowledge within the stories. Cuddlip’s first editor was Jack Nener, a fellow Welshman who was regarded as one of the old guard, but was experienced and regarded as a technical perfectionist. His views were to keep the old-time war spirit going, but would not shy if he did not approve of something, even if it meant swearing a dozen or so times.
Cudlipp would allow Nener to run the party freely, apart from Political news, which he used as a device to “SHOCK ISSUES”, which would be a political propaganda used to broadcast news, which would shock the readers with stories not conceived as being possible.
The political “SHOCK ISSUE” would not generate as many sales as hoped, but did stur opinion on the newsstands. Cudlipp would take control of the Political affairs in order to show The Mirror’s continued strong support of Labour, even though the Conservatives had regained power in the 1951 General Election.
This did not matter though as the changes had seen an increase in advertising revenue and it seemed that Hugh Cudlipp had the “Midas Touch.”
Alcohol was an integral part of the day-to-day running of a newspaper and this was evident in the office of The Daily Mirror, but Cudlipp cracked down on most forms of liquor, apart from Brandy and Wine. The drinking would made possible by the money trees, which were the salaries of the Journalists and editors and The Mirror was being seen by some as “more of a private bank, than an employer.”
These expenses were seen to have been fiddled about with in a way to ensure that salaries were kept lower and to avoid having to pay tax. It got to the point where some reporters were putting down prostitutes as executive expenses. However, the increased profitability of the paper ensured that Cudlipp could hire all of the best columnist and reporters Fleet Street had to offer and it become known that these people would become overnight celebrities, as famous as some of the film stars and sportsman of the time.
“Cassandra” was seen as the Mirror greatest weapon as he would use his column and a writing style deployed as “delayed drop” as he would write normally for a first couple of sentences and write a “knockout blow” that would rock the reader’s “glass chin.”
The Daily Mirror were truly going through its golden age, but a major rival was starting to simmer from the horizon and its invention would start the decline of newspapers, it’s name the Television.
In 1956 the newsprint rationing law was announced to end on January 1st 1959, which meant it would increase competition for advertising revenue for all British newspapers. At the same time the first commercial television station was launched called ITV and meant now television would compete from the newspaper for advertising revenue.
However, this was detour the continuing surge for The Mirror and by 1964 had over 5 million readers and had eclipsed, the now ageing and declining Daily Express were seeing sales fall as did the lives of their readers. From the mid 60’s the paper adopted a more foreign approach to reporting with various reports from all over the world including the Cold War and the every growing knockout list of Muhammad Ali.
Hugh Cudlipp was starting to enjoy the millionaire lifestyle he had earned and was not afraid to show his newfound wealth in front of friends and associates. With Cudlipp looking after the day-to-day running of the paper, this left Cecil King with the role of building up the media conglomerate and started to buy various media outlets across the entire western world and beyond.
This new media conglomerate, known as the IPC (International Publishing Corporation) was trying to sell of its most invaluable asset, The Daily Herald, which has seen it’s circulation drop to under a million again due to it’s readers dying old age. However, this was seen to be the last fully Labour supported paper and under soon-to-be Prime Minister Harold Wilson he negotiated with King and they decided to relaunch the paper as The Sun. Even though first day sales were at a healthy 3 million, sales continued to decline and The Sun was closed down in 1970 and would have to find a new buyer for a new lease of life.
The on-going argument between Labour and IPC same to a head on May 10th 1968 when King would produce a front-page article in The Mirror with the headline “ENOUGH IS ENOUGH” This reflected in his view that Harold Wilson should be removed from political office immediately. This was not the beginning as over a span of four years, he had conspired with Cudlipp to create a “coup”, which would see them with the help of Lord Mountbatten would relieve Wilson of his duties as Prime Minister and would create a new British government with help from the IRA. These finding would not come to light until over 20 years after this infamous article, which lead to the sacking of King from The Mirror and the IPC.
This would lead Hugh Cudlipp to take over as Chairman of The Mirror, but would not enter his office for weeks until everything that had come and was inherited in the King regime was removed from existence, never to be seen or mentioned again.
It was around this time that Australian millionaire Rupert Murdoch came into Britain to start his media empire starting with the easy purchase of The News of the World in 1969. His next step was to purchase The Sun from Cudlipp and the IPC and did so at some ease at a price, which many though was “reasonably cheap.” It was Murdoch’s aim to bring The Mirror down and make The Sun the biggest daily newspaper in the country and to do that he employed a key member of The Mirror group, Larry Lamb.
In order to starting building a law readership it was Lamb’s vision to take advantage of the “Babybloomers” that Cudlipp has ignored in the early 1960’s. Cudlipp was not worried and was mock Murdoch and his newest acquisition Lamb at every turn and thought that is was inevitable that the news version of The Sun would fail the same as its predecessor
Cudlipp decided to relaunch The Mirror as the first “quality tabloid newspaper.” The plan to kill off any kind of Sun revival was to create a new magazine, aimed at the younger audience. The Mirror magazine would be included in every Wednesday’s edition. This failed though and the IPC decided to cancel the magazine at once.
Within eighteen months of The Sun’s launch they had gained 2.5 million readers and The Mirror had lost a million and were struggling to find a solution or a “Plan B’ to the failed Mirror Magazine as sales drop and the advertising revenue dropped at the same time. The Sun would used enticing words like “WIN, SEX and FREE” to entice their now loyal readers and the overall news broadcast was better than The Mirror and it was seen as a win-win situation for Rupert Murdoch who realised that the amount he paid for the paper in the first place was small compared to the profits he was making.
By 1978 the every-growing battle between the papers, which had resulted in SHOCK TATICS, which defied belief had seen The Sun triumph in becoming the biggest selling daily newspaper in Britain.
Hugh Cudlipp would reign as chairman of The Mirror and IPC in 1974 and it was seen as the end of an era for a man seen as the greatest tabloid journalist of the 20th century. The Mirror would never recover and until this very day is still seen as the number two daily tabloid newspaper in Great Britain and still even throughout all of the controversy of press scandals and the on-going Leviasan Enquiry, which had seen The News of The World closed down, The Sun still remains as the biggest selling daily tabloid in the United Kingdom.
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