Harold Harmsworth
Harold Sidney Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Rothermere (born April 26, 1868 – died November 26, 1940) was a highly successful British newspaper proprietor, owner of Associated Newspapers and the founder of the Glasgow Daily Record and the Sunday Pictorial. He is known in particular, with his brother Alfred Harmsworth, the later Lord Northcliffe, for the development of the London Daily Mail and Daily Mirror. He was a pioneer of popular journalism.
Life and Work
Early life
Harold Harmsworth, the son of an indigent English barrister, was born in London, England. He left school early to become a tax, and after a postal clerk. When he was 21, his older brother Alfred Harmsworth persuaded him to join him in his magazine-publishing firm. In 1889 he started to work as the business manager of the Answers to Correspondents paper, the first paper of Harmsworth brothers. He had a talent for business, while his brother was a skilled editor.
Newspaper career
The success of Answers to Correspondents paper helped Harmsworths finance the children's paper, Comic Cuts and a woman's magazine, Forget-Me-Nots. In 1894 they purchased the Evening News, turning it into a prosperous papers. In 1896 they started with the publishing of the Daily Mail, which became one of the most successful papers in the country. It was the first newspapers in Britain that was particularly designed for masses. Slogans used to sell the newspaper included "A Penny Newspaper for One Halfpenny" and "The Busy Man's Daily Newspaper".
The Daily Mail reached circulation of 500,000, and during Boar War in 1899 even over a million. Based on such success, the brothers continued to expand their empire, and purchased the Sunday Dispatch and several other smaller newspapers.
In 1903 the Harmsworth brothers launched the first newspaper aimed at women, Daily Mirror. After initial rather cold reception, Harmsworths were forced to change the business strategy. They lowered the price of papers to a halfpenny, and filled it full of photographs. Within a month sales had dramatically increased.
In 1910 Harmsworth was made a baronet and in 1914 a baron. He was later raised to the peerage as Viscount Rothermere.
In 1914 Alfred Harmsworth decided to sell his share in the Daily Mirror to Harold. During the war the Daily Mirror became the most popular newspaper on the Western Front. It was probably that soldiers liked the papers because it was full of pictures and photographs that showed the life back home.
After the death of his brother Alfred in 1922, Harmsworth took full control of their newspaper empire. He ran the Evening News, the Sunday Pictorial, the Sunday Dispatch, Daily Mail, as well as the Daily Mirror.
Stepping into politics
In 1917 Harmsworth was appointed the President of the Air Council in the government of David Lloyd George. He vocally supported British government. His two sons were killed in the war.
In 1921, he founded the Anti-Waste League to combat what he saw as excessive government spending.
Harmsworth was an active opponent of communism. In 1924, just four days before the general election, Rothermere published the article about, what became known as the Zinoviev Letter, which urged British communists to promote revolution. The letter, later discovered to be a forgery, contributed to the defeat of the Labour Government on the elections.
Revision of the post-WWI treaties
Rothermere strongly supported revision of the Treaty of Trianon in favor of Hungary. During the 1920s he led a campaign to help Hungary regain its land that was given to Serbia, Romania, and Czechoslovakia as part of the country's punishment for participating in the World War I on enemy side. He became so popular in Hungary that he was offered the Hungarian Crown in 1927. He declined, but purchased estates in Hungary in case Britain should fall to a Soviet invasion. There is a memorial to Rothermere in Budapest.
Aircraft business
In 1934, a Mercury-engined version of the Bristol Type 135 cabin monoplane was ordered by Rothermere for his own use as part of a campaign to popularize commercial aviation. First flying in 1935, the aircraft caused great interest in Air Ministry circles on account of its top speed of 307 m p h being higher than that of any R.A.F fighter in service. Lord Rothermere presented the aircraft (named "Britain First") to the nation for evaluation as a bomber and in early 1936 the modified design was designated Blenheim Mk.I
Later career
In later life Rothermere became rather conservative and increasingly nationalistic. In 1929 he joined Lord Beaverbrook to form the United Empire Party. He urged the members of the Conservative Party to replace its leader, Stanley Baldwin with Beaverbrook.
He used his newspaper ownership in attempts to influence British politics, notably being a strong supporter of appeasement towards Nazi Germany, in part - it is thought - because of a shattering experience during WWI when he had two sons reported killed in the same week. In the 1930s, he argued for increased defense spending while being the owner of the only major newspapers to advocate an alliance with Germany. The Rothermere papers for a time in 1934 championed the British Union of Fascists (B.U. F), and were again the only major papers that did so.
Secret British government papers released in 2005 show that Rothermere wrote to Adolf Hitler congratulating him for the annexation of Czechoslovakia in 1938, and encouraged him to march into Romania. The MI5 papers also show that Rothermere paid a retainer of £5,000 per year to Stephanie Hohenlohe-Waldenburg-Schillingfurst, a glamorous Austrian princess and German spy, intending that she should bring him closer to Hitler's inner circle. She was known as "London's leading Nazi hostess". The secret services had been monitoring her since she came to Britain in the 1920s and regarded her as "an extremely dangerous person". As World War II loomed, Rothermere stopped the payments and their relationship deteriorated into threats and lawsuits.
Death
In 1932 Harmsworth retired as the chairman of Associated Newspapers, Ltd., turning the management his son Esmond. By that time he was among the richest people in Britain. In 1940 Baron Beaverbrook sent Harmsworth to a special war mission to Canada and the United States. Upon the completion of the job, Harmsworth went to Bermuda to take a rest. He died of dropsy in Bermuda, at the age of 72.
Legacy
Harold Harmsworth, together with his brother Alfred, built the most successful journalistic empire in British history and started popular journalism in that country. They founded the Daily Mail, which was the first British paper for the masses. Rothermere's descendants continue to control the Daily Mail and General Trust Plc.
Publications
- Harmsworth, Harold S. 1939. My campaign for Hungary. London: Eyre and Spottiswoode
- Harmsworth, Harold S. 1939. My fight to rearm Britain. London: Eyre and Spottiswoode
- Harmsworth, Harold S. 1939. Warnings and predictions. London: Eyre and Spottiswoode
ReferencesISBN links support NWE through referral fees
- Boyce, George D. 2004. "Harmsworth, Harold Sidney, first Viscount Rothermere (1868–1940)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press
- Britannica Online. Harold Sidney Harmsworth 1st Viscount Rothermere. Retrieved on March 16, 2007, http://www.britannica.com/ebc/article-9064189
- Clarke, Peter. 2004. Hope and Glory: Britain 1900-2000. Penguin. ISBN 0141011750
- Death of a Viscount. Time Magazine, Monday, Dec. 09, 1940. Retrieved on March 16, 2007, <http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,765027,00.html>
- Ferris, Paul. 1971. The house of Northcliffe: The Harmsworths of Fleet Street. Weidenfeld and Nicolson. ISBN 0297993860
- Schad, Martha. 2004. Hitler's Spy Princess: The Extraordinary Lifeof Princess Stephanie von Hohenlohe. Sutton Publishing. ISBN 0750935146
- Spartacus Educational. Harold Harmsworth. Retrieved on March 16, 2007, http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/BUrothermere.htm
- Taylor, S.J. 1996. The Great Outsiders: Northcliffe, Rothermere and the Rise of the Daily Mail. Weidenfeld & Nicolson, Ltd. ISBN 0297816535
External links
- Harold Harmsworth – Biography at Spartacus Schoolnet
- Rothermere memorial in Budapest – Photos of the monument in Budapest
- DMG, Rothermere and Northcliffe – Profile of Daily Mail & General Trust, founded by Harmsworths
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