Abstract

The Devil and Mr. Hearst

This article presents information on the book "The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst," by David Nasaw. David Nasaw thrusts Hearst back onto historical center stage in a rich and subtle new biography. The book is challenging the people to rethink Hearst's legacy. The first biographer to have access to the Hearst family archives, Nasaw uses an ocean of new material to drown half-truths, quash rumors and take much closer to Hearst's concrete persona and activities. William Randolph Hearst was born in 1863 in San Francisco, California, the only child of George Hearst, a barely literate mining speculator who rarely changed his shirt and liked to hang around with mining-camp rowdies, however rich he became, and Phoebe Apperson Hearst, a small-town music teacher and proper lady.