Philip Leslie Graham (July 18, 1915 – August 3, 1963) was publisher of The Washington Post from 1946 to 1963. July 18 is the 199th day (200th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 166 days remaining. ... 1915 (MCMXV) was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... August 3 is the 215th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (216th in leap years), with 150 days remaining. ... 1963 (MCMLXIII) was a common year starting on Tuesday (the link is to a full 1963 calendar). ... The Washington Post is the largest and oldest newspaper in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. ...

Graham, a tall, bespectacled, scholarly looking man, was an intimate friend of Vice President Johnson and a friend of President Kennedy. He was deeply involved in the selection of Johnson as the Democratic Vice Presidential candidate in 1960. He suffered from bipolar disorder (then referred to as manic depression) for which effective drug therapies were not yet available and which contributed to his eventual suicide in 1963. Bipolar disorder, often referred to colloquially as manic depression, is a diagnosis describing a mood disorder where the person cycles between states of depression and mania (or hypomania). ...

Early life

Philip (Phil) Leslie Graham was born on July 18, 1915, in Terry, South Dakota. He was raised in Florida where his father, Ernest R. ( "Cap") Graham, made a career in farming and real estate, and was a state senator. His mother, the former Florence Morris, had been a schoolteacher in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Phil Graham was one of four children. One brother, Bob Graham is former governor of the state of Florida (1979–1987) and was a United States Senator from 1987 to 2005. July 18 is the 199th day (200th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 166 days remaining. ... 1915 (MCMXV) was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... Official language(s) English Capital Pierre Largest city Sioux Falls Area  - Total  - Width  - Length  - % water  - Latitude  - Longitude Ranked 17th 199,905 km² 340 km 610 km 1. ... Official language(s) English Capital Tallahassee Largest city Jacksonville Area  - Total  - Width  - Length  - % water  - Latitude  - Longitude Ranked 22nd 170 451 km² 260 km 800 km 17. ... This article is about the place in South Dakota. ... This article is about the American politician. ... The United States Senate is the upper house of the U.S. Congress, smaller than the United States House of Representatives. ...

Graham graduated from the University of Florida in 1936, with a bachelor of arts degree in economics, and from the Harvard Law School, where he was editor of the Harvard Law Review and earned a magna cum laude degree, in 1939. In 1939-40 he was law clerk to Justice Stanley F. Reed of the United States Supreme Court, and the following year he was clerk to Justice Felix Frankfurter, who had been one of his professors at Harvard. University of Florida State University System of Florida FAMU FAU FGCU FIU FSU NCF UCF UF UNF USF UWF The University of Florida is a public university and land-grant institution located in Gainesville, Florida. ... Harvard Law School (HLS) is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. ... The Harvard Law Review is a journal of legal scholarship published by a student-run group at Harvard Law School. ... Stanley Forman Reed ( December 31, 1884 – April 2, 1980) was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court from 1938 to 1957. ... The Supreme Court Building, Washington, D.C. The Supreme Court Building, Washington, D.C., (large image) The Supreme Court of the United States, located in Washington, D.C., is the highest court (see supreme court) in the United States; that is, it has ultimate judicial authority within the United States... Justice Frankfurter Felix Frankfurter (November 15, 1882 – February 22, 1965) was a United States Supreme Court Associate Justice. ...

Marriage and children

On June 5, 1940, he married Katharine Meyer, the daughter of Eugene Meyer, a multi-millionaire and the owner of The Washington Post, a struggling newspaper at the time. The newly wed couple settled down in a two-story row house on 37th Street NW. June 5 is the 156th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (157th in leap years), with 209 days remaining. ... 1940 (MCMXL) was a leap year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1940 calendar). ... Katharine Graham Katharine Meyer Graham (June 16, 1917 – July 17, 2001) was the head of The Washington Post newspaper for more than two decades, overseeing its most famous period, the Watergate coverage that helped bring down President Richard Nixon. ... Eugene I. Meyer Eugene Isaac Meyer (October 31, 1875 – July 17, 1959) was an American financial, public official, and newspaper publisher. ...

During World War II, Graham enlisted in the Army Air Corps as a private (1942) and rose to the rank of major. Katharine followed him on military assignments to Sioux Falls, South Dakota and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania up until 1945, when he went to the Pacific theatre as an intelligence officer of the Far East Air Force. Combatants Allies: • Poland, • UK & Commonwealth, • France/Free France, • Soviet Union, • USA, • China, ...and others Axis: • Germany, • Italy, • Japan, ...and others Casualties Military dead: 17 million Civilian dead: 33 million Total: 50 million Full list Military dead: 8 million Civilian dead: 4 million Total: 12 million Full list World War II... The Army Air Corps is a vital component of the British Army. ... Sioux Falls (pronounced ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of South Dakota. ... Downtown Harrisburg Motto: Nickname: Map Political Statistics Founded c. ...

Their first baby died at birth. Four children followed: Elizabeth ('Lally') Morris Graham, now Weymouth, born on July 3, 1943; Donald Edward Graham, April 22, 1945; William Welsh Graham (1948), and Stephen Meyer Graham (1952). Elizabeth Morris Graham, commonly known as Lally Weymouth, (born 1943) is the daughter of the late Katharine Graham, the publisher of the Washington Post, and the late Phil Graham. ... July 3 is the 184th day of the year (185th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar, with 181 days remaining. ... 1943 (MCMXLIII) is a common year starting on Friday. ... Donald E. Graham Donald E. Graham is chief executive officer and chairman of the board of The Washington Post Company. ... April 22 is the 112th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (113th in leap years). ... 1945 (MCMXLV) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1945 calendar). ...

Career at The Washington Post Company

In 1946, Graham joined the Washington Post newspaper, as associate publisher. When Eugene Meyer become the first President of the World Bank, at the request of President Harry S. Truman, Meyer gave the position of the publisher to Graham, then 31. When Meyer left the World Bank at the end of 1946, he took the title of Chairman of the Board of the Washington Post Company, leaving Graham as publisher. Logo of the World Bank The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD, in Romance languages: BIRD), better known as the World Bank, is an international organization whose original mission was to finance the reconstruction of nations devastated by WWII. Now, its mission has expanded to fight poverty by means... Harry S. Truman (May 8, 1884 – December 26, 1972) was the thirty-fourth Vice President (1945) and the thirty-third President of the United States (1945–1953), succeeding to the office upon the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt. ...

In 1948, Meyer transferred his actual control of the Post Company stock (the company was privately owned) to his daughter and her husband. Katharine received 30 percent as a gift. Phil received 70 percent of the stock, his purchase financed by his father-in-law, who trusted Graham and believed that no man should have to be burdened with working for his own wife. Meyer remained a close adviser to his son-in-law until Meyer died in 1959, at which time Graham assumed the titles of President and Chairman of the Board of the Post company.

In 1950, the Post Company purchased the CBS television station in Washington, D.C., and changed the call letters to WTOP-TV. In 1953, the company bought television station WJXT (then WJMT) in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1953. Both purchases displayed good business acumen - television was new and had an uncertain future in the 1950s, and their ownership would generate profits critically needed until the late 1950s when the newspaper finally became consistently profitable. WTOP is the only all-news radio station in Washington, DC. WTOP is a class-A station operating on 820 kHz in Frederick, Maryland, WTOP-FM. As of January 4, 2006, WTOP also broadcasts on 103. ... WJXT is an independent television station serving Jacksonville, Florida and surrounding communities. ... Nickname: Where Florida Begins Official website: http://www. ...

In 1954, the Post Company bought the competing morning newspaper, the Times-Herald, for $8.5 million. The Post kept most of the Times-Herald's advertising, features, columnists and comics -- and most of its readers. It immediately jumped ahead of the Evening Star, the city's prominent afternoon paper, in circulation, and in 1959, it passed the Star in advertising linage. The Washington Star, previously known as the Washington Star-News and the Washington Evening Star, was a daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. between 1852 and 1982. ...

In 1961, the Post Company purchased the controlling stock interest in Newsweek magazine from the Vincent Astor Foundation. In New York City when the deal was closed, Graham wrote a check for $2,000,000 as a down payment on the $8,985,000 purchase price. The Newsweek logo Newsweek is a weekly news magazine published in New York City and distributed throughout the United States and internationally. ... Vincent Astor by Benjamin N. Duke William Vincent Astor (November 15, 1891, New York, New York, United States - February 3, 1959) was a businessman and philanthropist and a member of the prominent Astor family. ...

In 1962, the Post Company again expanded into the magazine field by buying Art News, the most widely read monthly in the art field, and Portfolio magazine, a hard-cover art quarterly, from Albert M. Frankfurter.

While running the Washington Post and other parts of the Post Company, Graham played a backstage role in national politics. In 1960, he helped persuade John F. Kennedy, with whom he was friends, to take Johnson, a close friend, on his ticket as the vice presidential candidate, personally talking with both men multiple times during the 1960 Democratic convention in Los Angeles, California. During the 1960 campaign, he wrote drafts of for several speeches that Johnson gave. After Kennedy and Johnson were elected in November, he successfully lobbied for the appointment of Douglas Dillon as Secretary of the Treasury, and had multiple discussions with Kennedy about other appointments. In the several years after the inaugural, he continued to write occasional drafts of speeches, primarily for Johnson, but also for the President and for Robert F. Kennedy. 1960 (MCMLX) was a leap year starting on Friday (the link is to a full 1960 calendar). ... John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to as John F. Kennedy, JFK or Jack Kennedy, was the 35th President of the United States. ... Nickname: City of Angels Official website: http://www. ... Dillons signature, as used on American currency Clarence Douglas Dillon (August 21, 1909 – January 10, 2003) son of Clarence and Ann (Douglass) Dillon, was U.S. Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to France (1953-1957) and 57th secretary of the United States Department of the Treasury (1961-1965). ... The United States Department of the Treasury is a Cabinet department and the treasury of the United States government. ... For the New Zealand cricketer, see Robert Kennedy (cricketer). ...

"First rough draft of history"

In April, 1963, Graham delivered a speech to the overseas correspondents of Newsweek in London which continues to be quoted -- though widely misattributed, even by Helen Thomas in her own memoir First Row at the White House: Helen Thomas - Senior White House Correspondent Template:S-protect Helen Thomas (born August 4, 1920) is a news service reporter and dean of the White House press corps. ...

So let us today drudge on about our inescapably impossible task of providing every week a first rough draft of history that will never really be completed about a world we can never really understand....

Health problems and death

In 1957, Graham suffered an episode of manic depression (although it was not so diagnosed until 1963.) The medicines that now can effectively treat the illness were not then available. He retired to the couple's farm in Marshall, Virginia, to recuperate. Manic depression, with its two principal sub-types, bipolar disorder and major depression, was first clinically described near the end of the 19th century by psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin, who published his account of the disease in his Textbook of Psychiatry. ... Marshall is a historic unincorporated town in Fauquier County, Virginia. ...

Thereafter, periods in which he functioned brilliantly alternated with periods in which he was morose and erratic and isolated himself. He often consumed too much alcohol (something he had done prior to 1957), and would become extremely argumentative and blunt.

Graham flew to Arizona in early 1963 with Robin Webb, an Australian newspaper stringer in Newsweek's Paris office, with whom he had started an affair in the summer of 1962. He showed up drunk at a newspaper publishing convention, grabbed the microphone, and asserted that John F. Kennedy was sleeping with Mary Pinchot Meyer. His assistant, James Truitt, called for his doctor, Leslie Farber, who flew in by private jet, as did (subsequently) Katharine. Graham was sedated, bound in a straitjacket, and flown back to Washington. He was committed for five days to Chestnut Lodge, a psychiatric hospital in Rockville, Maryland. He then left his wife for Robin Webb, announced to his friends that he planned to divorce Katharine and immediately remarry, and indicated that he wanted to purchase sole control of the Post Company. In June, in a depressive phase of his illness, he broke off his affair and returned home. On June 20, 1963, he entered Chestnut Lodge for the second time, and was formally diagnosed as being manic-depressive (bipolar). He was treated with psychotherapy. JFK redirects here. ... Mary Pinchot was born on 14 October 1920 in Marylands Eastern Shore. ... James Truitt (died 18 November 1981) was a journalist, born in Chicago, Illinois and raised by a prominent family in Baltimore, Maryland. ... Katharine Graham Katharine Meyer Graham (June 16, 1917 – July 17, 2001) was the head of The Washington Post newspaper for more than two decades, overseeing its most famous period, the Watergate coverage that helped bring down President Richard Nixon. ... Motto: Nickname: Map Location in Maryland Political Statistics Founded c. ... June 20 is the 171st day of the year (172nd in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 194 days remaining. ... 1963 (MCMLXIII) was a common year starting on Tuesday (the link is to a full 1963 calendar). ... Psychotherapy is a set of techniques intended to improve mental health, emotional or behavioral issues of individuals, family members or a whole familys interactional climate. ...

On August 3, 1963, after Graham had made repeated requests of his doctors to be allowed a short stay away from the hospital, and "quite noticeably much better," according to his wife, he was permitted to go to their farmhouse in Virginia for the weekend. There at 1 p.m., at age 48, he committed suicide with a 28-gauge shotgun. August 3 is the 215th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (216th in leap years), with 150 days remaining. ... 1963 (MCMLXIII) was a common year starting on Tuesday (the link is to a full 1963 calendar). ...

During probate, Katharine's lawyer challenged the legality of the Graham's last will, written in 1963. Edward Bennett Williams testified that Phil had not been of sound mind when Williams had drawn up Phil's final will. Williams said that he had, at the same time he prepared the will, written a memorandum for file stating that Graham was mentally ill, and that he was preparing the will at Graham's direction only to maintain Williams' relationship with the ill Graham. The judge in the case ruled that Phil had died intestate. Edward Bennett Williams (May 31, 1920 – August 13, 1988) was a Washington, D.C. trial attorney who owned several professional sports teams. ... Intestacy is the condition of the estate of a person who dies owning property greater than the sum of his or her enforceable debts and funeral expenses without having made a valid will or other binding declaration; alternatively where such a will or declaration has been made, but only applies...

References

• Personal History, Katharine Graham, Knopf, 1997, ISBN 0394585852.
• Philip Graham, 48, Publisher, a Suicide, New York Times, August 4, 1963
• Washington Post Company history, 1950-1974