Alfred Charles William Harmsworth, Viscount Northcliffe

Alfred Charles William Harmsworth, Viscount Northcliffe (born July 15, 1865, Chapelizod, near Dublin, Ireland—died August 14, 1922, London, England) was one of the most successful newspaper publishers in the history of the British press and a founder of popular modern journalism.

After an impoverished childhood and a few attempts at making a quick fortune, young Harmsworth embarked on freelance journalism as a contributor to popular papers, rose to editorial positions, and, inspired by the success of Tit-Bits, a popular weekly of informative scraps, decided to start a similar paper of his own called Answers to Correspondents. After some difficulty in securing financial backing, he began publication, soon shortening the name to Answers. As the paper gained public favour, he was joined by his brother Harold, whose financial ability and capacity for attracting advertising, combined with Alfred’s genius for sensing the public taste, made it a success. Answers was followed by many other inexpensive popular periodicals, chief among them Comic Cuts (“Amusing Without Being Vulgar”) and Forget-Me-Not, for the new reading public of women. These formed the basis for what became the Amalgamated Press (from 1959 Fleetway Press), the largest periodical-publishing empire in the world.

In 1894 Harmsworth entered the newspaper field, purchasing the nearly bankrupt London Evening News and transforming it into a popular newspaper with brief news reports, a daily story, and a column for women. Within a year circulation had grown to 160,000 copies, and profits were substantial. Conceiving the idea of a chain of halfpenny morning papers in the provinces, he bought two papers in Glasgow, Scotland, and merged them into the Glasgow Daily Record. He then decided to experiment with a popular national daily in London. The Daily Mail, first published on May 4, 1896, was a sensational success. Announced as “the penny newspaper for one halfpenny” and “the busy man’s daily journal,” it was exactly suited to the new reading public. All news stories and feature articles were kept short, and articles of interest to women, political and social gossip, and a serial story were made regular features. Although news headlines remained, at first, modest in size, far more were used than in any previous paper. With its first issue, the Mail established a world record in daily newspaper circulation, a lead it never lost while its founder lived.

Next Harmsworth bought the Weekly Dispatch when it was nearly bankrupt and turned it (as the Sunday Dispatch) into the biggest-selling Sunday newspaper in the country. In 1903 he founded the Daily Mirror, which successfully exploited a new market as a picture paper, with a circulation rivaling that of the Daily Mail. Harmsworth saved the Observer from extinction in 1905, the year in which he was made Baron Northcliffe. In 1908 he reached the pinnacle of his career by securing control of The Times, which he transformed from a 19th-century relic into a modern newspaper.

Northcliffe’s contributions to the British effort in World War I began with his early exposure in the Daily Mail of the British army’s shell shortage. His criticisms of Lord Kitchener aroused intense resentment in some quarters, but he also pressed for the creation of a separate Ministry of Munitions and for the formation (1915) of a wartime coalition government. For his service as head of the British war mission in the United States in 1917, he was created a viscount that year. He acted as the British government’s director of propaganda aimed at Germany and other enemy countries in 1918. By this time Northcliffe’s press empire appeared to hold such power over public opinion that he tried unsuccessfully to influence the composition of Prime Minister David Lloyd George’s cabinet. Always unpredictable, Northcliffe became the victim of a megalomania that damaged his judgment and led to the breakdown that preceded his death.

Northcliffe’s success as a publisher rested on his instinctive understanding of the new reading public that had been created by compulsory education. Though Northcliffe wanted political power, the effect of his newspapers upon public affairs is generally considered to have been smaller than he believed. His influence lay rather in changing the direction of much of the press away from its traditional informative and interpretative role to that of the commercial exploiter and entertainer of mass publics.