Thunder in the Rockies

A new owner, and new hope, for a once feisty daily

Of all those venerable dailies with presses and family ownership running back to the past century, few can match legends with the Denver Post. Founded in 1892, the Post really came to life three years later when it was grabbed up by an ex-barkeeper and entrepreneur named Harry Tammen and a rich but tightfisted developer, Fred Bonfils. For the next several decades, the two partners made the Post one of the liveliest, if least respected newspapers in the country. Advertisers were bullied, civic leaders were indiscriminately attacked, and readers came to know Publisher Bonfils' homespun creed: "A dogfight in a Denver street is more important than a war in Europe." Yet the formula worked; the afternoon Post regularly outsold its morning rival, the Rocky Mountain News (now owned by the Scripps-Howard chain). As Tammen liked to say, "We're yellow, but we're read, and we're true blue."

The yellow has paled considerably since the days of "Tarn" and "Bon," and so has the Post's financial picture. This year, for the first time, the Post was overtaken by the News in daily circulation, 271,000 to 260,000. Worse, pretax profits for the first eight months of 1980 plummeted to $78,000, from $3.6 million for the same period in 1979. Finally, because of a tangled financial scheme originally designed by a Bonfils heir to prevent the paper from falling into outsiders' hands, even those slim profits have been drained off to support part of Denver's new cultural center. Post Publisher Donald Seawell, 68, has long insisted that the paper was in great shape, but his reporters were not so sure, especially after the Post was put on the market five months ago.

Last week the Post gained a new owner, and new hope for halting its long decline. The Times Mirror Co. scooped up the paper for $95 million. It thus beat out the Washington Post Co.; Oil Millionaire Marvin Davis, 55; independent Media Mogul Karl Eller, 52; and others eager for a stake in the fast-growing, energy-rich Denver market. Times Mirror had revenues of $1.6 billion last year from a variety of communications businesses (cable TV, magazines, book publishing). The firm also owns seven newspapers, including the Dallas Times Herald and Long Island's Newsday. But Times Mirror is best known as owner of the Los Angeles Times (circ. 1,013,000), which under Publisher Otis Chandler, 52, has gained a reputation for spending lavishly to maintain editorial excellence.

At the Post, the second-floor city room exploded with war whoops and cheers when Editor William Hornby, 57, gave his staff the news. Said one reporter: "The alternatives were so dismal: a businessman or a bunch of bankers. They might have turned us into an office building." Exclaimed one of his colleagues: "Now we can really start newspapering again!"

Publisher Seawell called the Times Mirror "the best possible purchaser," adding, "I'm delighted with their enthusiasm. So many of our problems will be solved." Foremost among those problems has been the high cost of newsprint; Times Mirror Co. has plentiful supplies. And without the financial encumbrance of the Bonfils foundations, the Post may well return to those thrilling days when its profits, and its spirits, were Rocky Mountain high. -

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