Brush-Moore Newspapers

Brush-Moore Newspapers
IndustryMedia
Founded1927
Defunct1967
FateAcquired by Thomson Newspapers

Brush-Moore Newspapers, Inc. was a United States newspaper group based in Ohio which had its origins in 1923 and was sold to Thomson Newspapers in 1967 for $72 million, the largest ever newspaper transaction at that time.[1][2]

In 1923, Louis Herbert Brush, who had joined the Salem News (of Salem, Ohio) as a manager in 1894 and purchased it in 1897,[3] entered into a partnership with Roy Donald Moore and William Henry Vodrey, Jr. to purchase The Marion Star from then-U.S. President Warren G. Harding.[4][5] By 1924, Time magazine already noted the group as one of the prominent newspaper groups in the country, with four papers and a total circulation of 30,906.[6] In 1927, the "Brush-Moore" chain was created from their holdings.[3]

Brush and Moore

Joseph K. Vodrey, son of W.H. Vodrey Jr., became general manager of Brush-Moore Newspapers, Inc. in 1946. Vodrey was Vice-President and a member of the Brush-Moore board of directors from 1951 to 1968, when he retired. He also served as Vice-President and as a Director of the Beaverkettle Company.

At the time of the 1967 sale, Brush-Moore owned 12 daily papers, including six in Ohio (the Canton Repository, East Liverpool Review, Salem News, Steubenville Herald, Marion Star, and Portsmouth Times) three in California (Times-Standard, San Gabriel Valley Tribune, and Oxnard Press-Courier), and one in Maryland (Salisbury Daily Times), Pennsylvania (Hanover Evening Sun), and West Virginia (Weirton Daily Times), with a total circulation of approximately 540,000.[1][7]

  1. ^ a b Thomson Buys Paper Group, St. Petersburg Times (UPI), August 26, 1967
  2. ^ Newspapers: Strength in the Afternoon, Time (magazine), September 8, 1967
  3. ^ a b Louis H. Brush, 76, Publisher, Is Dead: Chairman of Board of Ohio Newspaper Chain is Stricken at Republican Convention, The New York Times, June 25, 1948
  4. ^ The Press: Ledger to Brush-Moore?, Time (magazine), January 2, 1939
  5. ^ Roy Moore Dead; Ohio Publisher, 66, The New York Times, May 2, 1954
  6. ^ The Press: Magnates, Time (magazine), March 3, 1924 ("The group owned by Louis H. Brush, Roy D. Moore, and William H. Vodrey, Jr.: the Marion Star, the East Liverpool Tribune, the East Liverpool Review, the Salem News—total circulation 30,906 daily.")
  7. ^ 12 Brush-Moore Newspapers Sold to Thomson, The New York Times, August 26, 1967