William Randolph Hearst: The Man Behind Modern Media and the Roots of “Fake News”
- dthholland
- 23 minutes ago
- 11 min read
On 29 April 1863, in San Francisco, California, William Randolph Hearst was born into a world already steeped in ambition, fortune, and opportunity. His name would come to symbolise the transformation of the American press—from sober reporting to the thrilling spectacle of scandal, sensation, and war-mongering. Many consider his legacy to be the spiritual beginning of what we now call fake news.
Yet Hearst's rise wasn’t entirely self-made.
The story begins with his father, George Hearst, a prospector turned millionaire who built a fortune from some of the most significant mining strikes in American history. George didn’t just dabble in mining; he was part of three of the biggest gold and silver discoveries ever recorded: the Comstock Lode in Nevada, the Homestake Mine in South Dakota, and the Anaconda Mine in Montana. These ventures made him immensely wealthy and led to his election as a United States Senator.
This immense financial cushion set the stage for young William to pursue ambitions far beyond ranching or digging in the dirt.
A Gambling Debt and a Young Man’s Ambition
In 1880, George Hearst accepted ownership of the struggling San Francisco Examiner to settle a gambling debt. At the time, the elder Hearst had little interest in newspapers. His energies remained focused on politics and mining, not publishing. But for William, it was a different story.
While attending Harvard University in the mid-1880s, William wrote to his father requesting control of the Examiner. George was unconvinced, preferring that his son oversee the family’s mining and ranching interests. William was persistent, and on 7 March 1887, he took the reins of the Examiner.
From the beginning, William demonstrated flair, imagination, and a strong sense of purpose. He called the Examiner "The Monarch of the Dailies", upgraded the printing equipment, hired the best writers he could find, and focused on sensationalism, scandal, and political exposés to drive readership. The newspaper quickly grew into a powerful local voice, full of stories designed to captivate, outrage, and inspire.
New York Ambitions and the Rise of Yellow Journalism
In the early 1890s, Hearst set his sights on New York, the heart of the American publishing industry. There, he purchased the New York Journal, positioning it against Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World in what became a circulation war that changed journalism forever.
The fierce competition between Hearst and Pulitzer led to the birth of yellow journalism—a term now synonymous with sensationalist reporting. The label was coined during this period and was defined in detail by journalist and historian Frank Luther Mott, who characterised it by:
Scare headlines in huge print, often used for insignificant news.
Lavish use of images, real or invented.
Fake interviews, misleading headlines, pseudo-science, and a parade of phony experts.
Full-colour Sunday supplements, often with comic strips.
Sympathy for the “underdog” in opposition to establishment power.
It was a deliberate shift from hard news to high drama. Hearst himself famously said that the ideal front page should provoke three emotional reactions:
“When the reader looks at Page One, he says, 'Gee-whiz.' When he turns to the second page, he says, 'Holy Moses.' And when he turns to the middle page, he says, 'God Almighty.'”
This approach sold newspapers in enormous numbers. But it also blurred the lines between fact and fiction in ways that would echo through the centuries.
"You Furnish the Pictures and I’ll Furnish the War"
One of the most enduring stories about Hearst involves the Spanish-American War. In 1897, Hearst sent artist Frederic Remington to Cuba to document Spanish repression during the Cuban War of Independence. Remington found the situation calmer than expected and reportedly wrote:
“Everything is quiet. There is no trouble. There will be no war. I wish to return.”
Hearst’s alleged reply became infamous:
“Please remain. You furnish the pictures and I’ll furnish the war.”
Although historians still debate the authenticity of this exchange, it fits Hearst’s reputation for provocative, conflict-driven journalism. He backed the Cuban rebels, portrayed the Spanish as barbaric, and pressured the U.S. government through headlines and public sentiment to take action. His newspapers stoked outrage that helped push the United States into war with Spain in 1898.
Whether he truly “furnished the war” or merely amplified the call to arms, Hearst’s influence was undeniable.
Around this time, Hearst met Marion Davies, a talented young showgirl and aspiring actress. They first encountered one another in 1917, and she quickly became his mistress and lifelong companion. Despite the significant age difference between them, their relationship endured for decades. Hearst, through his newspapers and film ventures, worked tirelessly to promote Davies’ acting career, securing her starring roles and extensive publicity.
Marion Davies was more than just a romantic partner; she became a significant presence in Hearst’s personal and professional life, attending countless lavish gatherings at San Simeon and eventually inspiring one of his most extravagant gifts.
In 1925, after seeing photographs in Country Life Magazine, Hearst purchased St. Donat’s Castle in the Vale of Glamorgan, Wales, for Marion. Hearst undertook extensive renovations, importing medieval and Renaissance architecture from Britain and Europe. Elements from Bradenstoke Priory in Wiltshire—including a guest house, prior’s lodging, a tithe barn, fireplaces, and a fourteenth-century roof—were painstakingly incorporated into the castle.
George Bernard Shaw famously remarked of the restored St. Donat’s:
“This is what God would have built if he had had the money.”
At St. Donat’s, Hearst and Davies entertained a glittering array of guests, including Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, Winston Churchill, and a young John F. Kennedy.
Financial Troubles: The 1930s Collapse
Despite his grandeur, Hearst’s finances spiralled out of control in the 1930s. His refusal to implement cost-cutting measures, even as advertising revenues dropped during the Great Depression, worsened the situation. By 1933, Hearst had mortgaged San Simeon to Harry Chandler of the Los Angeles Times for $600,000.could not pay the interest on the loans, let alone reduce the principal. The proposed bond sale failed to attract investors, as Hearst's financial crisis became widely known. As Marion Davies's stardom waned, Hearst's movies also began to haemorrhage money. As the crisis deepened, he let go of most of his household staff, sold his exotic animals to the Los Angeles Zoo, and named a trustee to control his finances. He still refused to sell his beloved newspapers. At one point, to avoid outright bankruptcy, he had to accept a $1 million loan from Marion Davies, who sold all her jewellery, stocks and bonds to raise the cash for him. Davies also managed to raise him another million as a loan from Washington Herald owner Cissy Patterson. The trustee cut Hearst's annual salary to $500,000, and stopped the annual payment of $700,000 in dividends. He had to pay rent for living in his castle at San Simeon.
Legally Hearst avoided bankruptcy, although the public generally saw it as such as appraisers went through the tapestries, paintings, furniture, silver, pottery, buildings, autographs, jewellery, and other collectibles. Items in the thousands were gathered from a five-story warehouse in New York, warehouses near his San Simeon home containing large amounts of Greek sculpture and ceramics, and the contents of St. Donat's. His collections were sold off in a series of auctions and private sales in 1938–39. John D. Rockefeller, Junior, bought $100,000 of antique silver for his new museum at Colonial Williamsburg. The market for art and antiques had not recovered from the depression, so Hearst made an overall loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars. During this time, Hearst's friend George Loorz commented sarcastically: "He would like to start work on the outside pool [at San Simeon], start a new reservoir etc. but told me yesterday 'I want so many things but haven't got the money.' Poor fellow, let's take up a collection."
He was embarrassed in early 1939 when Time magazine published a feature which revealed he was at risk of defaulting on his mortgage for San Simeon and losing it to his creditor and publishing rival, Harry Chandler. This, however, was averted, as Chandler agreed to extend the repayment.
Citizen Kane: Hearst's Battle with Orson Welles
The film Citizen Kane (released on May 1, 1941) is loosely based on Hearst's life. Welles and his collaborator, screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz, created Kane as a composite character, among them Harold Fowler McCormick, Samuel Insull and Howard Hughes. Hearst, enraged at the idea of Citizen Kane being a thinly disguised and very unflattering portrait of him, used his massive influence and resources to prevent the film from being released—all without even having seen it. Welles and the studio RKO Pictures resisted the pressure but Hearst and his Hollywood friends ultimately succeeded in pressuring theatre chains to limit showings of Citizen Kane, resulting in only moderate box-office numbers and seriously impairing Welles's career prospects. The fight over the film was documented in the Academy Award-nominated documentary, The Battle Over Citizen Kane, and nearly 60 years later, HBO offered a fictionalised version of Hearst's efforts in its original production in which James Cromwell portrays Hearst. Citizen Kane has twice been ranked No. 1 on AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies: in 1998 and 2007. In 2020, David Fincher directed Mank, starring Gary Oldman as Herman J. Mankiewicz, as he interacts with Hearst prior to the writing of Citizen Kane's screenplay. Charles Dance portrays Hearst in the film.
In 1947, Hearst paid $120,000 for an H-shaped Beverly Hills mansion, (located at 1011 N. Beverly Dr.), on 3.7 acres three blocks from Sunset Boulevard. The Beverly House, as it has come to be known, has some cinematic connections. According to Hearst Over Hollywood, John and Jacqueline Kennedy stayed at the house for part of their honeymoon. The house appeared in the film The Godfather (1972)
After the disastrous financial losses of the 1930s, the Hearst Company returned to profitability during the Second World War, when advertising revenues skyrocketed. Hearst, after spending much of the war at his estate of Wyntoon, returned to San Simeon full-time in 1945 and resumed building works. He also continued collecting, on a reduced scale. He threw himself into philanthropy by donating a great many works to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
In 1947, Hearst left his San Simeon estate to seek medical care, which was unavailable in the remote location. He died in Beverly Hills on August 14, 1951, at the age of 88. He was interred in the Hearst family mausoleum at the Cypress Lawn Memorial Park in Colma, California, which his parents had established.
His will established two charitable trusts, the Hearst Foundation and the William Randolph Hearst Foundation. By his amended will, Marion Davies inherited 170,000 shares in the Hearst Corporation, which, combined with a trust fund of 30,000 shares that Hearst had established for her in 1950, gave her a controlling interest in the corporation. This was short-lived, as she relinquished the 170,000 shares to the Corporation on October 30, 1951, retaining her original 30,000 shares and a role as an advisor. Like their father, none of Hearst's five sons graduated from college. They all followed their father into the media business, and Hearst's namesake, William Randolph, Jr., became a Pulitzer Prize–winning newspaper reporter.
The Legacy of “The Chief”
William Randolph Hearst was more than just a newspaper tycoon. He was a media pioneer, a political agitator, a cultural tastemaker, and, in some respects, a cautionary tale. His impact on journalism, entertainment, and even global politics cannot be overstated.
As he famously said:
“Putting out a newspaper without promotion is like winking at a girl in the dark – well-intentioned, but ineffective.”
In promoting his newspapers—and himself—so effectively, Hearst changed the world of media forever.
For those in need of some Citizen Kane facts -
It won the 1941 Oscars for Best Writing for an Original Screenplay, but was nominated for ninth overall. Which is kind of interesting, considering it is one of the best films of all time.
Initially, Kane was a failure at the box office; the hype and publicity surrounding it made it highly anticipated. But when it was released in the 50s, it was a let-down.
Its box office revenue was $1,585,634 in the U.S., and its budget was over $800,000.
Orson Welles was unrecognized for his work by the Academy until 1971, when he received an honorary Oscar “for superlative artistry and versatility in the creation of motion pictures.”
The film is loosely based upon the life of newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst. He was so angry when it came out that he accused Welles of being a communist, attempting to keep it out of the theaters.
To Hearst, the most offensive thing was the fact that “Rosebud” was not the name of a childhood sled. Reportedly, Hearst used this term as the name he gave his mistress’s unmentionables.
Many scenes of Kane were shot throughout the night, and the cast and crew would go to the bars at 6:30 a.m. once they called it a night.
During filming, Hearst had allegedly arranged for a naked woman to jump into Welles’s arms outside of his hotel room with a cameraman waiting. This way, the photo could be used as blackmail to keep Kane from being released. Welles wound up staying elsewhere that evening, and it is still unknown if this was true.
During the film’s production, Welles watched the 1939 Western film Stagecoach a rumoured 40 times.
According to the Hearst biography The Chief, Hearst responded to Citizen Kane by banning every newspaper and radio he had power over from running reviews of the film.
Welles invented and perfected the “deep focus shot” with the help of cinematographer Gregg Toland in Kane. The shots gave amazing clarity to both the forefront and background elements of the scene, thus giving off the illusion of depth in the two-dimensional world of the silver screen.
Welles also cut holes into the floors of his sets and the studio in order to get high angle shots, where we look up at Kane. This sort of angle is also used in order to create a powerful air around Kane, as others looked up to him and he looked down on everyone with his massive rise in the world.
In the scenes where Kane is making his major political speeches, the audience we see is not a real audience. It is, in fact, a still photograph. In order to create the illusion of a moving image, holes were poked into the image and light was shown through. (Take note in case you need to shoot a low-budget film and create a lot of fake people).
In retrospect, Citizen Kane can be considered an autobiographical film for Welles. It embodies the American dream and explores the rise to power and fame, along with its consequences
Orson Welles wrote, produced, directed and starred in it at the age of 25. People thought he peaked then; he became a has-been at such a young age, especially only after his first feature.
The entire premise of the film is focused around “Rosebud,” the last words of a man. However, when he says them, no one within earshot can hear it.
While filming the scene where Kane goes on his rampage breaking everything in his room, Welles cuts his left hand but continues filming the scene anyway, despite the excruciating pain. If you watch closely, you can see him cover his hand at one point and keep it hidden.
The original negatives for this film were lost in a fire in the 1970’s.
Applying makeup on Welles in order to portray an older Kane took several hours. The process would often start at 2:30 a.m. in order for him to be ready to go on set at 9 a.m.
The Hays Office and Hays Code passed the film for release, even with Hearst’s powerful agenda-setting eye overseeing everything.
During the San Francisco premiere of Kane, Welles happened to grab the same elevator as none other than William Randolph Hearst. He kindly invited the Chief to the premiere with him, who didn’t say anything. When Welles arrived at his stop, he said “Charles Foster Kane would have accepted."
Welles told the bigwigs at RKO that he was “in rehearsal” in order to keep them from hovering over his work on Kane, even though they were already filming. It took them about a week to realize Kane was well under way.
Due to the high angle and low angle shots Welles brought into the cinematic world, Kane was the first film to show the ceilings of rooms (as part of the set) on the silver screen. Instead of an actual ceiling, Welles stretched a cloth over the set’s skeleton in order to let light in. This was also important since he filmed in black and white, and it’s especially difficult working with lighting there.
In 1982, Steven Spielberg bought the “Rosebud” prop for $60,500 at an auction, which Welles didn’t even think was still around.
Taylor Swift’s music video for “Blank Space” was filmed at the same place Xanadu’s aerial shots were done: Oheka Castle in Long Island, NY.
Facts compiled from IMDB
