Houston Chronicle Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ===1956β1965: John T. Jones era=== The board of Houston Endowment named John T. Jones, nephew of Jesse H. Jones, as editor of the ''Chronicle''. Houston Endowment president, J. Howard Creekmore, was named publisher. In 1961, John T. Jones hired [[William P. Steven]] as editor. Steven had previously been editor of the ''[[Tulsa Tribune]]'' and the ''[[Minneapolis Star Tribune]]'', and credited with turning around the declining readership of both papers. One of his innovations was the creation of a regular help column called "Watchem", where ordinary citizens could voice their complaints. The ''[[Chicago Tribune]]'' later called this column a pioneer and prototype of the modern newspaper "Action Line".<ref name="ChiTrib">Heise, Kenan. "W. P. Steven, Ex-newspaper Executive." ''[[Chicago Tribune]]''. August 11, 1991. Retrieved October 5, 2011.[http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1991-08-11/news/9103270877_1_william-p-steven-houston-chronicle-city-editor]</ref> Steven's progressive political philosophy soon created conflict with the very conservative views of the Houston Endowment board, especially when he editorially supported the election of [[Lyndon B. Johnson]], the Democratic candidate for president. However, more than political philosophy was involved: Robert A. Caro revealed in his biography of Johnson that written assurance of this support from John T. Jones had been the price demanded by Johnson in January 1964 in return for approval of the merger of Houston's National Bank of Commerce, in which Jones had a financial interest, with another Houston bank, the Texas National.{{sfn|Caro|2012|pages=523β527}} In 1964, the ''Chronicle'' purchased the assets of its evening newspaper competitor, the ''Houston Press'',<ref name="tsha"/> becoming the only evening newspaper in the city. By then, the ''Chronicle'' had a circulation of 254,000βthe largest of any paper in Texas. The ''Atlantic Monthly'' credited the growth to the changes instigated by Steven.<ref name = "Atlantic">Bagdikian, Ben H. [https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1969/12/houston-apos-s-shackled-press/6926/ theatlantic.com "Houston's Shackled Press"]. ''Atlantic Monthly''. August 1966. Retrieved March 25, 2010.</ref> In the summer of 1965, Jones decided to buy a local television station that was already owned by the Houston Endowment. He resigned from the Houston Endowment board to avoid a conflict of interest, though he remained as publisher of the ''Chronicle''. On September 2, 1965, Jones made a late-night visit to the Steven home, where he broke the news that the Endowment board had ordered him to dismiss Steven. Jones had to comply. On September 3, the paper published a story announcing that Everett Collier was now the new editor.<ref name = "Atlantic" /> No mention was made of Steven or the Houston Endowment board. ''Houston Post'' staff wrote an article about the change, but top management killed it. Only two weekly papers in Houston mentioned it: ''Forward Times'' (which targeted the African-American community) and the ''Houston Tribune'' (an ultra-conservative paper). Both papers had rather small circulations and no influence among the city's business community.<ref name = "Atlantic" /> The two major newspapers in Houston never mentioned Steven for many years thereafter. Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page