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Wednesday, Nov 25, 2009
Kay Graham's unintentional rise to glory inspired the Washington Post to a greatness the paper has never again achieved since she stepped away from it.
Jul 18, 2001 | The beauty of Kay Graham was that she didn't want to be the mighty Katharine Graham, one of the most influential publishers of the 20th century, or Kay Graham the hostess, whose invitations to her Georgetown manse were almost as coveted as ones to the White House. I always got the impression -- from observing her and interviewing her and reading her autobiography -- that she would have been perfectly happy to have led the simple life of a woman born to wealth whose days are complicated only by the demands of family and the occasional dinner party. She was a shy, ugly duckling who gradually grew into the leader she was forced to become, and when she arrived, she realized she could be herself, effortlessly.
Kay Graham would have appreciated her sudden exit, at age 84. Attending a meeting of executives in Sun Valley, Idaho, she tripped and banged her head Sunday, fell into a coma and died Tuesday, without languishing and putting anyone through a long period of keening or handwringing. It was a quick, uncomplicated parting.
Forgive me for contributing to the inevitable hagiography, but this is one person who deserves it. Katharine Graham was the accidental publisher, the unintentional feminist, the unexpected journalist. She always surprised people. She had ineffable qualities that can't be learned or taught or bought: gumption, guts, instinct, heart, passion for truth. Raised in privilege, she was able to connect with hundreds of thousands of regular folks, not because they saw her face on TV or in the tabloids, because Kay never appeared there, but because of how she comported herself in moments of tragedy and how she shared them in a dignified way in her book, "Personal History," which won a Pulitzer Prize in 1998.
Growing up in Washington in the 1920s, Graham was not a pretty or petite girl, which her mother, Agnes Meyer, reminded her of often. Back then that may have been tolerated; now it might be termed abusive. Her father, Eugene Meyer, came from a Jewish investment banking family and made millions organizing the Allied Chemical Co. He doted on "Kate." Her mother was Lutheran, and she was brought up by a governess, was educated at a proper prep school and finished with classes in French and tennis and posture. She came away from her childhood feeling unloved and unappreciated, and without much ambition.
In 1933 Eugene Meyer bought the Washington Post in a bankruptcy auction for $825,000. Four years later, when Katharine Meyer was a senior at the University of Chicago, she realized her father wanted her to learn the newspaper business and perhaps join him at the Post. In a letter to her older sister, she said she might want to be a reporter, but she despised the business side. "I doubt my ability to carry a load like the Washington Post," she wrote, "and I damn well think it would be a first-class dog's life."
At age 22, Kate Meyer married the dashing Philip Graham. Her father made him publisher of the Post; they had four children; they cavorted with Kennedys and Lippmans and Alsops. Kay Graham packed her husband's bags and took care of the kids. Phil bought Newsweek, oversaw the expansion of the paper and became a usual suspect in the parties and intrigues of the capital city in the 1950s. It was a high life, but Phil also brought Kay low by having an affair with a Newsweek reporter. Then he began to suffer manic-depressive mood swings. She stayed by his side during his stays at mental hospitals, even when he rejected her. Then, one day in August 1963, at their Virginia estate outside Washington, she heard a shotgun blast, rushed to Phil's room and found him dead on the bathroom floor.
Three days later, at 46, Katharine Graham was driven to the Washington Post to address its board of directors. She was petrified of speaking in public. She rehearsed her lines in the car with her daughter, Lally. She told the roomful of men that nothing would change, that she was now in charge and that they should get back to work. She then took a cruise before taking the reins of the paper.
When I interviewed Graham in 1997, before the publication of "Personal History," she made it sound simple. "I began by just wading in and learning from experience," she said. "Whatever strength I had was enhanced by dealing with Phil's illness. Trying to take care of him undoubtedly gave me some strength."
