The Legacy of Citizen Robert
At 21 Robert Decherd set out to capture the prize that had eluded his father: the throne of Texas’ most powerful media dynasty. At 34 he has won control of the Dallas Morning News and much, much more—but to what end?
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Robert Decherd’s man had turned the Dallas newspaper war upside down. But not everyone stayed around to savor the victory. Seven months after Osborne’s arrival, Terry Walsh, the man who had been passed over, took a Friday off. That night he returned to the building, emptied his desk and files into cardboard boxes, and posted a short note on the bulletin board: “Nice to have known you people.” Then walked out of the empty newsroom, never to return.
The Last Goal
With Osborne in place, Decherd returned to the battle against the Dealeys. The question of public ownership had been before the board of directors, unresolved, for three years. Decherd could wait no longer. He drafted a long memo to Dealey and Moroney reviewing the company’s options and concluding that going public was inevitable.
Dealey, in character, was still reluctant. Moroney took up Decherd’s cause, met privately with Dealey, and cajoled him to move. On Christmas Day 1980, the descendants of G. B. Dealey gathered at Moroney’s home for the annual family Christmas party. The next day Dealey met Moroney and Decherd in his office. He was ready to go along. Dealey did no more than authorize the hiring of three investment banking firms to study whether Belo should go public; as was his wont, he really made no final decision at all. But it set Belo rolling inexorably down the path to public ownership. As usual, Decherd was delegated to handle the details. From that day forward, the Belo Corporation was Robert Decherd’s company.
A year later Belo offered two million shares of its stock to the public at $23 per share. Joe Dealey sold 133,350 of his shares, Jim Moroney 111,000. Robert Decherd, now Belo’s single largest stockholder, did not sell a share. Following the public offering, his Belo shares—9.4 percent of the company—took on a market value of $20 million.
Decherd’s vision for Belo was almost fully realized. He had saved its newspaper, he had taken it public, he had thwarted the Dealeys, he had taken charge. Only one thing remained to be done; he had yet to bring Belo into the big time as a media company. Belo was ready for it, thanks to the stock sale and Joe Dealey’s don’t-borrow policies. By the end of 1982 the company had working capital of almost $64 million, including $47 million in cash and securities, and of course no debt to speak of. All it needed was the right deal.
In May 1983 Dun and Bradstreet announced that it was placing its six television stations, known as the Corinthian Broadcasting Group, on the market. Five were to be sold right away but individually, while the sixth—KHOU in Houston—would be withheld until 1984. Decherd was interested but not on Corinthian’s terms. He wanted all the stations, especially KHOU. He flew to New York and laid out a counterproposal to Dun and Bradstreet’s bankers. Belo wanted to make the pitch in person to Dun and Bradstreet’s management, he said. If they would provide financial data on KHOU, Belo would make a specific offer within 24 hours. Dun and Bradstreet agreed to grant Belo an audience.
In the evening, after making its initial presentation, the Belo delegation was given the Houston numbers. Decherd’s new financial officer called Dallas, fed the figures into a computer, and calculated a price. Moroney looked at the number; it was so staggeringly big that he couldn’t even say it. “Six hundred thousand,” he kept saying, and finally he wrote out a cue card displaying the figure—$600,000,000—so he wouldn’t make a mistake and sound like a small-timer in the meeting.
But when Moroney made the offer, the Dun and Bradstreet executives huddled and then said no. Now it was Belo’s turn to huddle. They had no idea how much more to offer. They decided. What’s another one per cent? Belo returned and offered $606 million; take it or leave it, said Decherd. Dun and Bradstreet took it. Robert Decherd had brought off the largest broadcast acquisition in the country’s history. The last goal was met. Belo was in the big time.
Two months after the Corinthian acquisition was announced, Joe Dealey, Jr., stepped into Robert Decherd’s office. Joe Junior had been happy writing editorials, but in 1980 he had become a vice president at his father’s insistence. It quickly became apparent that he lacked the skill and personality to join the high-powered team that Decherd was assembling. In an earlier day a place would have been made for a family member who didn’t quite fit in, but Belo wasn’t a family company anymore. “I’ve thought it all over,” he told Decherd. “I don’t see a big future for me here at Belo.” Joe Junior, the erstwhile heir to the Belo empire, was leaving the company. At last he was doing what he wanted; he would not tell his father until after submitting his resignation. Ten months later he took a job as PR chief for the Dallas—Fort Worth airport. In the fourth generation, the Dealey dynasty had come to an end.
Joe Senior had also seen the handwriting on the wall. Going public had made him wealthy, but it had also completed the transformation of Belo into Robert Decherd’s company. In the late summer of 1982, at 63, Dealey sat down with Jim Moroney and told him that he had had enough. Joe Dealey was giving up his title two years early. Moroney, the perennial second fiddle, became chief executive officer of Belo. After announcing his decision, Dealey vacated his large office in the News building and moved into a small suite in a North Dallas bank tower. He remained chairman of the board, but he rarely visited his relatives at the company. He began devoting his days to the civic activities that had always interested him most.
His final demotion came two years later, in an episode that evidenced his confusion and bitterness about what had happened to his company, himself, and his son. The occasion was Belo’s annual meeting in April 1984, when Robert Decherd was shepherding a set of shareholder resolutions to block a potential hostile takeover of Belo. Approval required a two-thirds vote, but prospects for passing the proposals looked good—until Joe Dealey, chairman of the company, disclosed shortly before the meeting that he was voting no.
Decherd and Moroney were dumbfounded. Joe had voted for the measures in board; he had signed the proxy statement urging their approval; he couldn’t vote against the company. Why not, Dealey wanted to know. Why couldn’t he vote the way he wanted? As stalemate threatened to become chaos, Dealey reverted to form. Having dragged his feet, he finally gave in and voted for the shareholder measures. The board met privately after the annual meeting and asked Dealey to leave the room. He could no longer be chairman, of course. The board members agreed that Joe would remain a director but not stand for reelection as chairman. Jim Moroney assumed the last of Joe Dealey’s titles. Nine months later, on January 1, 1985, Robert Decherd, at the age of 33, became the president of the A. H. Belo Corporation.
In the twelve years since he returned to Dallas, Decherd has acquired the kind of personal wealth that G. B. Dealey could never have imagined. His compensation from Belo in 1984 totaled $434,840; he earned an additional $627,938 in dividends. At a closing price of $51 per share on the New York Stock Exchange, his stock in the A. H. Belo Corporation was recently worth more than $44 million.
Through his position at Belo, Decherd has become a man of influence in Dallas. In his city of businessmen, young Decherd has joined the inner circle of business leadership. He serves on the Dallas Citizens Council and the executive committee of the Dallas Chamber of Commerce. But ultimately Robert Decherd’s influence, like that of the three generations of Dealeys before him, is reflected in the pages of his newspaper. Thus it has always been at the Dallas Morning News, a paper that reflects the personality not of its editor but of its publisher. At its best the News has possessed the spirit and integrity of G. B. Dealey; at its worst, the small mindedness of Ted Dealey. What will be Robert Decherd’s legacy?
When Decherd returned to Dallas, he set out to beat back the Herald‘s challenge and to assure the long-term financial success of the News. That he has done. In the past five years the News has tripled its daily circulation advantage; it now leads the Herald by an almost insurmountable 125,000 copies every day of the week. Last year the News made Belo $33 million. Barring a reversal unprecedented in the history of journalism, the Dallas newspaper war is over. The Dallas Morning News has won.
But Robert Decherd also set out, one day while a student at Harvard, to work on a great newspaper. There is no question that he has improved the News substantially. It has become, once again, one of the nation’s top regional papers. Much like Robert Decherd, the News is thorough and deep, sober and responsible.
But it suffers as well as benefits from its leader’s personality. At the Harvard Crimson Decherd tested the waters before launching his political views. In Dallas he has fashioned the News with the help of market studies and consultants; it is carefully designed to please. As a result, the Morning News today, for better and for worse, is a remarkable mirror of its city—thriving, ambitious, upbeat, clean-cut, and mannered. It maintains a passionate interest in sports and business, a fawning obsession with the wealthy, a desire to do the right thing, a parochial view of the world, and an abiding belief in Dallas. The News‘ columnists include not a single cynic, and Decherd offers no apologies for that. He considers it appropriate for his upbeat town. He defends even the News’ unenlightened editorial page by citing market studies showing that readers love it. “You have to reflect your readership,” says Decherd. “We have changed the Morning News to reflect what we opine the readers want.”
The problem is that a great newspaper must do more than reflect. Robert Decherd’s News, like that of Ted and Joe Dealey, lacks the independent vision of its city that the paper’s founder possessed. “There is a popular idea abroad that a newspaper should give the people what they want,” George Bannerman Dealey once declared. “This I do not believe in its entirety. Generally, the readers should be given what they want so long as what they want is good for them.”
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