Personal History

Amazon.com

In lieu of an unrevealing Famous-People-I-Have-Known autobiography, the owner of the Washington Post has chosen to be remarkably candid about the insecurities prompted by remote parents and a difficult marriage to the charismatic, manic-depressive Phil Graham, who ran the newspaper her father acquired. Katharine's account of her years as subservient daughter and wife is so painful that by the time she finally asserts herself at the Post following Phil's suicide in 1963 (more than halfway through the book), readers will want to cheer. After that, Watergate is practically an anticlimax.

Book Description

Winner of the 1998 Pulitzer Prize for Biography

An extraordinarily frank, honest, and generous book by one of America's most famous and admired women, Personal History is, as its title suggests, a book composed of both personal memoir and history.

It is the story of Graham's parents: the multimillionaire father who left private business and government service to buy and restore the down-and-out Washington Post, and the formidable, self-absorbed mother who was more interested in her political and charity work, and her passionate friendships with men like Thomas Mann and Adlai Stevenson, than in her children.

It is the story of how The Washington Post struggled to succeed -- a fascinating and instructive business history as told from the inside (the paper has been run by Graham herself, her father, her husband, and now her son).

It is the story of Phil Graham -- Kay's brilliant, charismatic husband (he clerked for two Supreme Court justices) -- whose plunge into manic-depression, betrayal, and eventual suicide is movingly and charitably recounted.

Best of all, it is the story of Kay Graham herself. She was brought up in a family of great wealth, yet she learned and understood nothing about money. She is half-Jewish, yet -- incredibly -- remained unaware of it for many years.She describes herself as having been naive and awkward, yet intelligent and energetic. She married a man she worshipped, and he fascinated and educated her, and then, in his illness, turned from her and abused her. This destruction of her confidence and happiness is a drama in itself, followed by the even more intense drama of her new life as the head of a great newspaper and a great company, a famous (and even feared) woman in her own right. Hers is a life that came into its own with a vengeance -- a success story on every level.

Graham's book is populated with a cast of fascinating characters, from fifty years of presidents (and their wives), to Steichen, Brancusi, Felix Frankfurter, Warren Buffett (her great advisor and protector), Robert McNamara, George Schultz (her regular tennis partner), and, of course, the great names from the Post: Woodward, Bernstein, and Graham's editorpartner, Ben Bradlee. She writes of them, and of the most dramatic moments of her stewardship of the Post (including the Pentagon Papers, Watergate, and the pressmen's strike), with acuity, humor, and good judgment. Her book is about learning by doing, about growing and growing up, about Washington, and about a woman liberated by both circumstance and her own great strengths.

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An extraordinarily frank, honest, and generous book by one of America's most famous and admired women -- a book that is, as its title suggests, both personal and history. It is the story of Katherine Graham's parents: the multi-millionaire father who left private business and government service to buy and restore the down-and-out Washington Post; the aggressive, formidable, self-absorbed mother, known in her time for her political and welfare work, and her passionate friendships with men such as Thomas Mann and Adlai Stevenson.

Customer Reviews:

Insider look at Washington .......2006-12-26

My only regret is that I did not pay more attention to Katharine Graham and the Washington Post while she was alive. Through unveiling her own insecurities and illustrating how she moved into one of the most powerful women in the world, I learned US History and the trials of a CEO woman in the 1960s and forward.

Ms. Graham reveals much about "inside Washington" and does a particularly good job of making the "players" come to life. I really hated to see the book end. Yet, Ms. Graham did what she set out to do -- documented a time in our history. Kathy Condon Executive Coach

Great book.......2006-11-13

Fantastic, gripping book, though it bogged down for me near the end with the minutia of labor/management disputes at the Washington Post. Still recommend highly.

This is a useful item.......2006-11-06

Katharine Graham's book is a useful study of life in Washington and the Washington Post. This is a very nice audio version of the book. For those who haven't the time to read, or have vision limitations, this is a very good substitute for the book.

Kathryn Graham, a personal history.......2006-02-25

Albeit a native of Washington, D C., I nevertheless found this
autobiography most absorbing. Intelligently yet personally written, including her own frequent self-analyses. Highly recommended,
I was sorry to finish it! BBBSS

I wonder if reviewers really read the book?.......2005-12-12

Do the reviewers on here really read the books? One reviewer above stated that Katherine Graham found her husband after he had hanged himself. No, she found him after he had shot himself. This is no small point, as later in the book, she reveals how hurt she was by a sign carried in an anti-Post parade during the newspaper strike that read, "Phil shot the wrong Graham." This is a fascinating book, and anyone posting a review of it on a forum like this should at least give it the respect of getting the basic facts straight.

Average customer rating:

a Great Read --- a smart, smart author who "Gets It" -
Who's worse, politicians or the press?
Politics as "high school"
It's terrible
Get to the point already!

Washington
Meg, Greenfield
Manufacturer: Public Affairs
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1586481185
Release Date: 2002-07-02

Amazon.com's Best of 2001

Meg Greenfield is one of the legends of Washington, D.C. For more than three decades as a columnist and editor, writes Katharine Graham in a loving foreword, "she helped create the institutional voice of the Washington Post." This book, written secretly in the final two years of her life and now published posthumously, is a wonderfully incisive piece of work. Greenfield really understood the city she came to settle in, and she really understood people. Her observations are sharp and profound:

Public people almost eagerly dehumanize themselves. They allow the markings of region, family, class, individual character, and, generally, personhood that they once possessed to be leached away. At the same time, they construct a new public self that often does terrible damage to what remains of the genuine person. That is not because people here are bad or set out in the first place to become phonies, but rather because high politics in the city seems to reward the transformation. It is regarded as a measure of competence and required as a condition of success.

She has plenty to say about the media: "Journalists who persist in regarding themselves as thoroughly clean and the world around them as thoroughly dirty are guilty of more than misplaced moral vanity. They are also in danger of rendering themselves incapable of plausibly explaining what they are covering--except as further implied evidence of their own virtue." Greenfield was a powerful Washingtonian, but like so many Washingtonians--not least the elected lawmakers--she came from somewhere else (in her case, Seattle). In many ways, this book is a guide to keeping from going native, or, as historian Michael Beschloss nicely puts in an afterword, "how to live at the center of political and journalistic influence in Washington without losing your principles, detachment, or individual human qualities." Washington is part memoir, but mostly observation by a keen watcher and analysis by an acute mind. It stands to become a small classic on life in America's capital and, in a way, life anywhere. --John J. Miller

Book Description

With Washington, the illustrious longtime editorial page editor of The Washington Post wrote an instant classic, a sociology of Washington, D.C., that is as wise as it is wry. Greenfield, a recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for commentary, wrote the book secretly in the final two years of her life. She told her literary executor, presidential historian Michael Beschloss, of her work and he has written an afterword telling the story of how the book came into being. Greenfield's close friend and employer, the late Katharine Graham, contributed a moving and personal foreword. Greenfield came to Washington in 1961, at the beginning of the Kennedy administration and joined The Washington Post in 1968. Her editorials at the Post and her columns in Newsweek, were universally admired in Washington for their insight and style. In this, her first book, Greenfield provides a portrait of the U.S. capital at the end of the American century. It is an eccentric, tribal, provincial place where the primary currency is power. For all the scandal and politics of Washington, its real culture is surprisingly little known. Meg Greenfield explains the place with an insider's knowledge and an observer's cool perspective.

Customer Reviews:

a Great Read --- a smart, smart author who "Gets It" -.......2006-08-22

and then Tells It like it is -

not just about washington dc or politics - about human nature any time/ any place ---

i recommend this to young adults out of college...

both Meg Greenfield and Meryl Streep figured out that "life isn't like college -

life is like... High School!"

when i was growing up, my mother would say "when you're older, you'll find out What Life Is All About"...

and i'd wonder What's The Big Mystery? Why Don't You Just Tell Me Now... so i can know NOW?

this book is brilliant, fun, laying it out truthfully, plainly, like almost no one does --- no WONDER that wonderful people (like Kay Graham) loved this woman and her amazing insights -

i loved the time i spent reading her book, and recognizing so much of what i had learned firsthand in the 40 years since i wondered What Life Was All About.

Who's worse, politicians or the press?.......2006-08-08

After reading Meg Greenfield's fascinating, though uneven book I must confess, I have a much more sympathetic regard for politicians than I did before, and a much lower opinion of the press. I doubt this was the author's intention, though she is not sparse in her criticism of both worlds. However, she manages to humanize politicans to a much greater degree than she does the press, despite her characterization of Washington as high school. Her chapters where she explains the trials and tribulations of Washington life and how they effect politicians manufactured images and their families made me much more sympathetic to their plight; while her willingness to bash the press for their all to willing role in this, made me more critical of that instituition. INdeed, the last and best chapter of the book, which focuses on the press, clearly paints them as all too frequent liars and prone to mislead as the typical politician, as much as by what they say as by what they do not say. Its to the authors credit that she is not afraid to take her own profession to task. Perhaps that is why she waited until she was dead to have the book printed. Whereas politicians are constantly having to balance their image with their own and the country's principles and self-interest, I dont believe that the press operates under as many constraints, or with as much at stake, or with as much self-knowledge.

All in all its an unusual and fascinating memoir and analysis of what makes Washinton tick (its the people stupid,), and even when I often disagree with her analogies or observations, she still makes you think. REcommended for those who are close followers of Washington and the press. Rest in peace Meg!

Politics as "high school".......2004-12-28

Looking back on nearly four decades as a journalist in the nation's capital, Meg Greenfield's (Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post editorial page editor and Newsweek columnist) "Washington" eschews personal memoir or tell-all sensationalism for a witty, ascerbic take on how the place functions and how it's changed.

The analogy that best fits its structure and function, Greenfield says, is high school. "High school is a preeminently nervous place." Isolated from the larger community, it operates on "a make-or-break, peer-enforced social code that calculates worth as popularity and popularity as a capacity to please and be associated with the right people (no matter how undeserving they may be...." Congress has "terms", its work grinds to a halt during long vacations, and its "freshmen" are expected to tow the line and show deference to their elders, while seniors wield the power and set the rules.

It's a rarified high school, comprised of "successful children." These are not only the hall monitors and teachers' pets, the civic award winners and "the ones who mowed the neighbor's lawn and were pronounced `fine young people, but also "a small but steady stream of amazing prevailers...the determined, express-train kids who knocked down all the obstacles and were the first in their families to do practically everything." Few troublemakers or rebels aspire to a Washington career, and in this clear-eyed assessment Greenfield includes herself, "nothing if not reliable, and, in fact, sometimes seeming to have been fifty years old at birth."

Like herself, many Washington denizens have a "rogue" sibling (like the long line of first brothers - Sam Johnson, Donald Nixon, Billy Carter, Roger Clinton - and that's just during Greenfield's tenure). "You may take it as a rule of thumb that the children who came to Washington are not the ones who put the cat in the dryer but the ones who tattled." The psychology is more complex than that, involving guilt, love, even a certain admiration for the brash willfulness or impulsiveness so foreign to the "good" child and Greenfield does a clever, often humorous job of explaining how "good child" psychology makes government work on many levels, including staff and press.

Greenfield's study of Washington psychology goes on to encompass family. Wives (Washington is still primarily a man's town, "a recovering man's town, but still a man's town"), children and particularly parents who knew him "when" have the ability to cut the big man down to human size. "When even he, in the gathering derangement that marks his ascent to public notice, has come to think of himself as synonymous with the title and image, they will not." Many pols, she points out, had powerful parents, particularly mothers, and their good child personas keep them striving for approval. With a few hilarious and humanizing anecdotes she shows a general reduced to earnest pleading, a senator pushed into a public apology. Greenfield's depiction of wives, on the other hand, and the stultifying social rounds expected of them, makes the reader wonder how any Washington marriages survive.

When Greenfield started out in 1961 the position of women was such that she was not permitted to set foot in the National Press Club, not even to check the wire service ticker. She was routinely excluded from "old boy" meetings and patronized in interviews, a penchant she learned to exploit. Greenfield candidly explores her own complex feelings and acquiescence in this system, even to comporting herself so as not to "threaten" her male subordinates' egos.

Much of the old-boy network is changing, but not entirely for the better, says Greenfield. "This new culture is also redolent of high school, but high school at its most dangerously deranged." The appearance of taking a stand has become more important than getting things done - for a politician it's a sound bite, for a journalist it's the headline. A freshman who would have voted as he was told in the old days in exchange for a good assignment or a morsel of pork now runs to any number of TV outlets to denounce the intimidation, possibly even propose hearings. Smear campaigns and self-righteous posturing have replaced much of the back-room dealing. Though Greenfield is far from waxing nostalgic about the old days, she does explain how private give-and-take worked to get landmark civil rights legislation passed, among others.

Greenfield concludes the book with a discussion of journalism - the delicate line between cooperation and collusion, the hypocrisy of virtue, the formulation of an ethics code at the Post. Ironically, this is the least compelling section of the book, not because of any reticence on Greenfield's part, but because journalistic soul searching has become so fashionable there is little new here.

A thoroughly enjoyable portrait of a peculiar and important place, written in secret before her death from cancer at age 69, Greenfield's account is enhanced by a warm personal foreword from Post publisher Katherine Graham and an equally affectionate afterword by historian Michael Beschloss, who aptly sums up Greenfield's central theme: "how to live at the center of political and journalistic influence in Washington without losing your principles, detachment or individual human qualities." Engaging, witty, and humanizing, Greenfield's "Washington" can be appreciated even by those who feel alienated by and cynical about our nation's politicians.

It's terrible.......2004-01-17

I cannot agree more with the reviewer who panned this book. Meg Greenfield may have been a great journalist, but a great journalist does not a great author make.

She never gets to the POINT. While there are some mildly interesting stories about people in government, a far better book is (her former boss) Katharine Graham's Washington. Spend your money on it.

Get to the point already!.......2003-09-18

With all due respect to the deceased - this book was awful! As was mentioned by a previous poster - this book needed some heavy duty editing.

I felt like I was eating a cake that layer upon layer of icing, never getting to the acutal cake. And about the time you realize that there is no cake - along comes another beautiful cake with loads of icing - so you switch to that cake, and go through layer after layer after layer of icing, only to find, again, there's no cake.

After reading 129 of the 226 pages (not counting the afterward), I finally put the book down in frustration - and I don't know that I could tell you what the book actually says! There's supposed to be a whole breakdown on how DC is like High School, and how everybody reverts to, and longs after, their high school years. All I can remember about that is something about smart kids and David Stockman. No explination of the other various types in high school, jocks, nerds, geeks, cheerleaders, the "in" crowd, the Big Man on Campus, Captain of the Football team, or Student body president.

Looking at this, I think that it would have been much better served as a series of bite sized essays - because that's what they really are. None of the topics are really examined in depth, none of her suppositions are explained in depth or detail. Few, if any, real world, concrete examples to back up her suppositions about the various types of people in DC. It seemed as if she would make a statement, "dance" around the edges of it, acting as if, any minute, she would swoop in and provide some basis, or support for her statement. All the while using colorful, flowery, yet meaningless language.

What others call "rich" and "intelligent" writing, I call verbose, superfluos, overly wordy. I would have to sum it up as 129 pages of not much (and I'm guessing the remaining 97 pages wouldn't be much better).

This book was a monumental dissapointment.

Average customer rating:

A great gathering of wonderful writings

A must read for anyone interested in Washington

Katharine Graham's Washington
Katharine Graham
Manufacturer: Knopf
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Personal History

The Georgetown Ladies' Social Club: Power, Passion, and Politics in the Nation's Capital

A Good Life: Newspapering and Other Adventures

Power, Privilege and the Post: The Katharine Graham Story

Washington

ASIN: 0375414711
Release Date: 2002-10-22

Book Description

A final legacy from Katharine Graham: an all-embracing, highly personal collection of writ-ings (more than one hundred articles, essays, and excerpts from books) about Washington, D.C. -- covering the period from 1917, the year of her birth, to early 2001, just before she died.

Here are the president-watchers (including Will Rogers on Calvin Coolidge) . . . high points from insider memoirs (among them Dog Days at the White House by the presidential kennel keeper) . . . Washington moments vividly recalled -- by Henry Kissin-ger (on the end of the Nixon presidency), by FDR’s secretary (on Mrs. FDR), by Joseph W. Alsop, Ben Bradlee, David Brinkley, Dean Acheson, Harry Truman, Rosalynn Carter, and Nancy Reagan.

Here is humor by Art Buchwald, P. J. O’Rourke, Russell Baker . . . social Washington, from royal visits to rival hostesses . . . traumatic moments in the city’s history -- including the news of Pearl Harbor and the deaths of Presidents Roosevelt and Kennedy . . . a loving appreciation of the city by David McCullough. Here, also, are charming period pieces, astute appraisals of how Washington works, and stimulating considerations of the not-always-happy realities of life in a place that during Mrs. Graham’s lifetime evolved from a provincial southern city to the capital of the world.

Katharine Graham’s comments have the same acuity, humor, and candor that so charmed and moved the hundreds of thousands of readers of her Pulitzer Prize -- winning autobiography.

Customer Reviews:

A great gathering of wonderful writings.......2004-03-11

After reading Graham's personal history I was dissapointed that there was nothing else written by her. This book fufills that dissapointment. She provides all sorts of views about Washington even though she doesn't agree with them all. There are articles written by Nancy Reagan, Henry Kissinger, Alice Roosevelt, and many, many more. A great read for anyone interested in Graham or Washington.

A must read for anyone interested in Washington.......2003-01-18

I am not completely finished with this book, but wanted to post a review urging all who are interested in the history of our country to read this.

Mrs. Graham has gathered articles from many people associated with the govenment and also some who were natives of Washington and in the social scene. Some were White House employees. She has written an introduction to each article which is helpful.

There are many interesting stories never seen before. I especially liked the articles of behind the scenes preparations for the visit of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth in 1939 by White House employees. Eleanor Roosevelt's article is different than the one she has in her book as it does not include the stop at Hyde Park.

Mamie is presented as a difficult taskmaster by the White House seamstress. All good reading.

I don't know if young folks will enjoy this book as much as I did, but they should give it a try.

Book Description

THE BOOK THEY TRIED TO SUPPRESS ...

When the first edition of Katharine the Great was published, Katharine Graham had it pulled from the bookstores and pulped. But Deborah Davis sued the publishers for censoring her book, and won. Now this new, updated edition goes beyond Watergate all the way through Contragate, and shows how the Washington Post has changed during the Reagan-Bush years.

Although Katharine Graham is surely one of the most powerful women in the world, few people are aware of the extent of her influence. World leaders meet with her; presidents meet with her; anyone moving up in the circles of power in the nation's capital tries to meet with the owner of the Washington Post - Newsweek communications conglomerate.

Katharine the Great is the story of a woman born into wealth and power. Her husband, the brilliant, mercurial Philip Graham, became the publisher of her father's paper, the Post, while she settled down to home life. But by the 1950s Philip Graham was battling manic depression, and in 1963 he committed suicide.

Middle-aged and inexperienced, Katharine Graham took over the newspaper. Together with Ben Bradlee she made the Post successful and powerful, publishing the Pentagon Papers and pursuing the Watergate investigation that led to Richard Nixon's resignation. After Watergate, the Post- and Kay Graham - became an institution, a fourth branch of government.

Customer Reviews:

Liberal Biased Press My You-Know-What.......2004-10-14

I was really quite surprised at this bio of Katharine Graham, owner of The Washington Post (and Madison Council member of the Library of Congress).

I did not realize just how filthy rich this woman was. I found the story of her family (as well as the Jewish heritage) quite fascinating. I did not know, for instance, that her father was responsible for the way stocks are now weighted. That he was able to come up with a scientific (or qualifiable) means to rate stocks was truly revolutionary.

It was due to this wealth that Katharine was introduced to the high and mighty at an early age. Being born self-confident and rich always gives people an edge. I was impressed with her education in that, unlike many rich people, she actually tried to make a difference while at school.

What is most disturbing is the background on how intelligence agencies completely took over the print media. That individuals like Phil Graham and Ben Bradlee were intelligence agents and believed the press should advance government positions shows just how depraved these individuals really were. Not one of them bothered to read or understand the Constitution and the need for a free press.

After Graham died (a tad convenient, don't you think?), Katharine became one of the worst suck-ups to the government. As on page 249, Ward Just was reporting on how badly the Vietnam War was going. Can't have that, you know. Bradlee and Katharine replaced his defeatist reporting with uber-hawk, hack scribbler, and future Library of Congress Director of Communications (brought in by CIA Billington) Peter Braestrup. His take on the Tet Offensive, The Big Story, is always good for a laugh.

There is, because of this, much speculation regarding who did Nixon in. Was it a CIA plot? Katharine's relations with the CIA went beyond Phil Graham and Bradlee. Even Bob Woodward was a former intelligence officer. After reading this book you do wonder why these CIA types can't be satisfied with writing their reports from Langley.

This book can be a bit weak on sources, but it certainly does give a good overview of just what this woman was really all about.

[Garbage].......2002-04-28

This book relies on innuendo and loose causality to "prove" itself. Most of the sordid material relates to Ben Bradlee and Phil Graham, not to Katharine herself. One of the worst conspiracy theories ever constructed. Not edifying in any way. Read Katharine Graham's autobiography "Personal History," instead of this [garbage].

Establishment Icon.......2001-04-22

A pretty good title, when you think of it. The Two Kates. Both German (or in Katharine's case, half- German), both with husbands who couldn't cut it and who died leaving power in their hands. Both loving secrecy and both believing that the full story wasn't necessary for the masses to hear. Is it outrageous that the first edition of this book was killed? Yes. After all, Ms. Davis wasn't one of Graham's reporters, to be brought to heel by an editor like Bradlee. Independent thought - how threatening to major media? Of course it is embarrassing to have someone question your motives in Watergate, the Post's most astounding triumph. Of course it is embarrassing to have your husband's suicide and prior mental illness discussed openly, along with his grandiose gaffes during the course of it. All very painful. And then to have your crusading editor, Benjamin Crowninshield Bradlee described as an Old Boy with CIA/USAID ties, who helped ease the Rosenberg's into their electric chairs by conducting counter-intelligence in France in the 50's. The French were suspicious of our motives in executing these spies. The campaign of rhetoric which our secret government agencies conducted was to show that these were not political murders, but the normal workings of a democracy, not a totalitarian state. This is an appendix to the main work, but its purpose is to show Bradlee's access to something perhaps more powerful than the Nixon White House in its darkest, most paranoid hours. The thesis presented is that Nixon did not go because of the Watergate cover-up, but possibly because he (like the late Mr. Graham) was nuts and thus a security threat. Deep Throat is advanced as being known not just by Woodward (former Office of Naval Intelligence), but by Bradlee. In other words, the People still don't know the deeper story. Graham's family background is done deftly and intelligently. Her family had been able to connect with wealth and power from its first days in America, but also (through her mother, Agnes)with cutting-edge stylists and image-makers. Agnes seems to have fallen in love in late middle age with the emigre writer Thomas Mann, and to have exercised great psychological power over him. Agnes seems to have given the blessing to her daughter, and to have encouraged her to take over the Washington Post. The underlying mother-daughter story is of deep interest. In fact, Agnes almost seems to reach for power through her daughter, after resigning in alcoholic frustration from important affairs herself. This book is worth a few re-readings. It works on so many levels.It will have you questioning the Hollywood version of crusading reporters who work for well-entrenched media giants.

Liberalism and Media Control.......2000-04-26

I have read this book and find it to be both entertaiining and informative.It works on the both the level of biography and media criitique. What Davis has done is to record the history of the Graham family fortune along with the liberal ideological adornments that almost makes the familiy and Katharine Graham somewhat sympathic personages. Almost is good choice with respect to this bunch. Because, as the author does so well in outlining the byzsantine grap for political influence of the Post and its owner, we become aware that the Graham liberalism follows the same path as described by J.S. Mill and smowhat more. Classic liberalism seeks power just as the conservative money class does but with a singular difference that ,it is the message not the methods that makes the difference between the two. The classic liberal, and Graham was cetainly cut from that cloth, wants to promote the cut of fairness, individual rights and the rule of law. In other words the liberal wants everyone to feel equal and that the game of capitalism is a fair game. Thus we have the Washington Post , guardian of fairness, publishing the Pentagon Papers, exposing America's shameful war. Or so goes the myth. But Davis puts the lie to this myth and exposes the CIA links and other covert operative connections in the Post. She exposes the CIA connection with Ben Bradlee, editor of the Post. As we now know, the media in America is far from free( and this applies so much so to the money class who own the media) but as Davis shows the media is infiltrated by government operatives ( especially at the national level) . So as anyone who reads this book will see the media and press must be taken with a grain of doubt.

Power, Privilege and the Post: The Katharine Graham Story

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From family forsakeness to media maven
The single most useful book about the Post.
How To Become a Successful Businesswoman
a balance of gossip and substance

Power, Privilege and the Post: The Katharine Graham Story
Carol Felsenthal
Manufacturer: Seven Stories Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 188836386X

Customer Reviews:

From family forsakeness to media maven.......2003-05-24

This is an excellent book about Katherine Graham, former owner and publisher of The Washington Post. Katherine is initially, for all intents and purposes, ignored by her family throughout her youth. Little attention is bestowed upon her as her father, Eugene Meyer, runs The Washington Post and her mother, Agnes Meyer, socializes with every powerful individual she possibly can. Katherine perseveres through these harsh circumstances only to have her husband, Phil Graham, blow his brains out in the bathroom of one of their homes during a respite from an insane asylum. Katherine takes control of the newspaper (and company behind it), makes it the most influential paper in the nation, and becomes the most powerful woman in the world in the process. I recommend this book for any individual seeking a source of inspiration. This book should, and will hopefully, inspire many downtrodden people the world over for years to come.

The single most useful book about the Post........2002-01-06

I've read every book I could find about Katharine Graham and the Washington Post -- and if you're only going to read one, this is it. Complex business dealings are explained clearly, people are approached evenhandedly, and scandals (public and private) are discussed without either shirking or sensationalism (and with a lot of citations.) The book focuses on the personalities of these fascinating people, making for a riveting story.

How To Become a Successful Businesswoman.......2001-11-24

Biographer Carol Felsenthal turned her fine talents ro Katherine Graham and produced a top-notch bio, one which the reader can easily understand, and feel for, the housewife-turned-Fortune 500 businesswoman. What sticks in my mind is how Graham's distant mother finally decided to talk to her daughter about menstruation, to which Kay replied, "I started that last year."
Rich detail such as this makes it easy to see why Readers Digest condensed the book, and opens up a controversy over just how much of Felsenthal's research was co-opted by Graham herself to write, or have ghostwritten, her "Personal History." Felsenthal's objectivity adds to Graham's life story in a way only a detached biographer can. If one wants a map of how a shy woman can succeede in the business world, one can do no better than to read Felsenthal's illuminating text.

a balance of gossip and substance.......2001-05-14

Ever since I read Halberstam's the Powers that BE, I wanted to read more in depth about Kay Graham. She is a fascintaing character: taking over the Post after the suicide of her manic depressive husband, she was the one to bring it to greatness. Not only did she overcame fear and terrible personal insecurity, but with Watergate and the Pentagon Papers she earned a place in history. That is not bad for an heiress that everyone dismissed as a figurehead when she took over.

Unfortunately, Felsenthal brings few new revelations to her well researched and long book. The facts are there, as is much of recent US history. Instead, what she adds is more on the level of back-biting gossip, such as the tales of her dysfunctional children, her fickleness at the office, or her insensitive quips about money ("you mean you have to live on your salary" she is quoted as asking a reporter.) At times, the book has the flavor of personal pique: you can tell that she doesn't like her subject. Felsenthal even seems bent on undoing the reputation of her star editor, Ben Bradley, whom she portrays as a capable courtesan manipulator of Graham. While this perspective is useful, it appeared biased to me, too consciously against the grain of popular image.

However, if you don't know the story of Kay Graham, this is a solid introduction. Recommended with reservation.

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Good Book

Why she was "one of the greatest publishers of the last two centuries"

Katharine Graham: The Leadership Journey of an American Icon
Robin Gerber
Manufacturer: Portfolio Hardcover
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Power, Privilege and the Post: The Katharine Graham Story

Katharine Graham's Washington

ASIN: 1591841046

Book Description

For more than twenty years Katharine Graham was a self-described “doormat wife.” But after her husband's suicide, she took over as publisher and CEO of The Washington Post and shocked the male executives who bet against her success. She defied the government by publishing the Pentagon Papers, took on the president in the Watergate investigation, and stood down a violent labor strike. Through every challenge she stuck by her values, building a diverse, profitable, and much-admired company.

Graham's bestselling memoir Personal History gave readers this great woman's intimate view of her own story. Now, Robin Gerber focuses on the heart of Graham's success: her leadership. Gerber shows how Graham overcame an emotionally impoverished childhood, deep insecurities, and a marriage to a brilliant but mentally ill husband.

Drawing on exclusive interviews with some of her closest friends and colleagues, such as Ben Bradlee, Sally Quinn, Margaret Carlson, and Gloria Steinem, Gerber analyzes the principles that guided Graham's toughest decisions.

Perceptive and thought provoking, Katharine Graham provides a wealth of lessons for anyone moving up the leadership ladder. It's also a deeply inspiring and hopeful book, offering women who continue to face sexism in the workplace a model for personal triumph.

Customer Reviews:

Good Book.......2006-09-11

This was an interesting book that covered the personal life of Katherine Graham in great detail. However, I really had a hard time finding much about her true leadership style other than perhaps two sentences in the entire book. The totality of her leadership style would have to be deduced through the anecdotal material presented in the book. If you want to really know who she was and what she did, this is the one book to read. Was she a tremendous individual who fought hard to keep and build a great organization? Yes. Is it worth the time to read it? Yes.

Why she was "one of the greatest publishers of the last two centuries" .......2005-10-20

Why read this book? A convincing answer is provided by Jim Collins in the Foreword, and I quote: "If I were forced to pick one business leader from whom to draw professional learning and personal aspirations, that one leader would very likely be Katharine Graham." As is the case with other great leaders, Collins explains, she delivered great results during her tenure, achieved a distinctive impact on the world "by creating a a role model that others follow," presided over "a significant crisis or renewal, in part by creating a role model that others follow," and finally, she left a legacy that "transcends her own tenure, and ultimately beyond her life." High praise indeed and wholly justified by Graham's professional achievements and personal integrity.

What we have in this volume is Robin Gerber's probing, illuminating analysis of a woman who once observed that she led "what I thought of as two separate lives. Wife and mother for twenty-three years, and then working person for thirty." It is her career as CEO of the Washington Post Company which has attracted the most attention but only by understanding her as a daughter, wife, mother, and widow, however, can we possibly appreciate both her personal growth and professional achievements. Of course, in her own memoirs (Personal History and Katharine Graham's Washington) she shares much of the same material which Gerber covers also. Here are what I consider to be especially significant facts:

1. Until her husband, Philip, committed suicide, Graham had had almost no direct involvement in the business world.

2. Following his death, she refused to sell the company and became its CEO, relying heavily on the management team to face a series of crises.

3. First, whether or not to publish the Pentagon Papers and thereby risk prosecution under the Espionage Act, jeopardize the company's IPO, and perhaps its lucrative television licenses. She decided to publish.

4. Then, whether or not to support Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein's investigation of the Watergate break-in and thereby incur the full wrath of the Nixon administration. She provided that support although, as she later admitted, "I was terrified" and "quaking in my boots."

Gerber skillfully examines each of these and other stressful situations and defining moments. Of greatest interest to me is Graham's gradual, sometimes painful acquisition of business acumen despite the shock and grief caused by her husband's death, especially at a time when the Post Company was going through its own serious difficulties. As countless others have already pointed out, Graham eventually developed outstanding leadership qualities and management skills without at any time compromising her personal decency and integrity. At the time of her death, those who knew her best loved her as much as they respected her.

If you share my high regard for Gerber's book, I urge you to read those which Graham wrote, "in her own words" and apparently without professional assistance. She was genuinely astonished by the fact that Personal History immediately became and then remained a bestseller. Few others were. Certainly no one among more than 4,000 who attended her funeral service on Monday, July 23, 2001, at Washington National Cathedral.

Robert McNamara served as a pallbearer with Vernon Jordan and her brother-in-law, Senator Robert Graham of Florida. Herbert Allen, Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Mike Nichols, Jim Lehrer, Diane Sawyer, Barbara Walters, and Bob Woodward were among the ushers. Senators arrived in a bus as did hundreds of her associates at the Washington Post. In his eulogy, Ben Bradlee fondly referred to her as "Brenda Starr, girl reporter, [always] at the scene and ready to go." Probably better than anyone else did, Bradlee understood why having both "the heart of a journalist" and "the head of a businesswomen" made Katharine Graham "one of the greatest publishers of the last two centuries."

Let's Go! Let's Publish!: Katharine Graham and the Washington Post (Makers of the Media)

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Let's Go! Let's Publish!: Katharine Graham and the Washington Post (Makers of the Media)
Nancy Whitelaw
Manufacturer: Morgan Reynolds Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Library Binding

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ASIN: 1883846374

Book Description

From the author of They Wrote Their Own Headlines: American Women Journalists comes the story of the Washington Post and how it became one of America's most important newspapers. It is also a biography of Katharine Graham, who suddenly found herself guiding the newspaper through the turmoil of the Vietnam War, Watergate and into the 1990s.

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Katharine Graham (Women of Achievement)
Sandy Asirvatham
Manufacturer: Chelsea House Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0791063100

Katharine Graham and 20th Century American Journalism (Mattern, Joanne, Women Who Shaped History,)

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Katharine Graham and 20th Century American Journalism (Mattern, Joanne, Women Who Shaped History,)
Joanne Mattern
Manufacturer: PowerKids Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Library Binding

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ASIN: 0823965007

Guess who's not coming to dinner.(Washington 2002): An article from: Columbia Journalism Review

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Guess who's not coming to dinner.(Washington 2002): An article from: Columbia Journalism Review
Roxanne Roberts
Manufacturer: Columbia University, Graduate School of Journalism
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

General | Politics | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Columbia Journalism Review, published by Columbia University, Graduate School of Journalism on September 1, 2002. The length of the article is 1527 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Guess who's not coming to dinner.(Washington 2002)
Author: Roxanne Roberts
Publication: Columbia Journalism Review (Refereed)
Date: September 1, 2002
Publisher: Columbia University, Graduate School of Journalism
Volume: 41 Issue: 3 Page: 24(2)

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