Blair Clark | |
|---|---|
| Born | Ledyard Blair Clark (1917-08-22)August 22, 1917 |
| Died | June 6, 2000(2000-06-06) (aged 82) Princeton,New Jersey, U.S. |
| Education | St. Mark's School |
| Alma mater | Harvard University (AB) |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouses | |
| Children | Timothy Clark Cameron Clark Ian Clark Tomasz Malinowski (stepson) |
| Parent(s) | William Clark Marjory Bruce Blair |
| Relatives | Anne Clark Martindell (sister) C. Ledyard Blair (grandfather) |
Ledyard Blair Clark (August 22, 1917 – June 6, 2000)[1] was anAmerican liberaljournalist andpolitical activist who played key roles both as a journalist and a political operator. He was general manager and vice president ofCBS News from 1961 to 1964, and later became editor ofThe Nation magazine. He was SenatorEugene McCarthy's national campaign manager for the1968 presidential nomination.
Clark was born inEast Hampton, New York, in 1917, the son ofWiliam Clark (1891–1957) and Marjory (née Blair) Clark (1893–1975).[2] He was named after his maternal grandfather, investment bankerC. Ledyard Blair. He was raised inPrinceton, New Jersey and attended boarding school atSt. Mark's School inSouthborough, Massachusetts. In 1940 he graduated with anA.B. degree fromHarvard College, where he was a member of theSpee Club andHasty Pudding Institute of 1770.[3] He was also the editor and president ofThe Harvard Crimson.[4]
Clark had a knack for connecting with talented and ambitious people. AtSt. Mark's School, Clark became friends with poetRobert Lowell. At Harvard he befriended classmateJohn F. Kennedy; they remained in touch throughout Kennedy's political career, and Clark andJacqueline Kennedy Onassis corresponded for decades. JournalistTheodore H. White was also a long-time contact.
From 1941 to 1946, Clark reported for theJoseph Pulitzer Jr.-ownedSt. Louis Post-Dispatch before serving in theUnited States Army.[5]
In 1946, Clark used a $60,000 inheritance from his grandmother to foundThe New Hampshire Sunday News. The newspaper's star reporter wasBen Bradlee, who was also an alumnus of St. Mark's and Harvard and later become executive editor ofThe Washington Post. Within two years, theSunday News had the highest circulation in New Hampshire. When theNew Hampshire Union Leader threatened to compete with its own Sunday paper, Clark sold theSunday News to Union-Leader Corporation in 1948 for a substantial profit.[6]
DuringWorld War II, Clark served in the Army as deputy historian for Gen.George S. Patton Jr.'s 3rd Army.[7]
In 1953, he joinedCBS News in Paris, and later became producer and anchor ofThe World Tonight on theCBS Radio Network, now known as the nighttime edition of theCBS World News Roundup. In 1961, PresidentJohn F. Kennedy offered Clark the ambassadorship to Mexico, but instead he became general manager and vice president of CBS News. He expanded the radio and television coverage of CBS News by hiring additional correspondents in the United States and abroad. He worked withEdward R. Murrow, and among those he hired at CBS wereWalter Cronkite,Dan Rather,Mike Wallace,Morley Safer,Roger Mudd andBill Plante.[5][6]
After leaving CBS, Clark was associate publisher of theNew York Post, editor ofThe Nation magazine, and a fellow of the New York Institute for Humanities atNew York University. He was an influential early supporter ofThe New York Review of Books. Subsequently, he taught atNew York University andPrinceton University.[7]
Clark first met Senator Eugene McCarthy in 1965 at a party atWalter Lippmann's house inWashington, D.C. Two years later, when McCarthy announced that he would challenge PresidentLyndon Johnson in the 1968 Democratic primaries as an anti-war candidate, Clark wrote to McCarthy from London to express his support. With his friend,Theodore H. White, Clark traveled to Chicago in December 1967 to hear McCarthy address the Conference of Concerned Democrats, a group of anti-war activists. Soon after meeting in Chicago, McCarthy asked Clark to be his campaign manager.[6]
In his new position within the campaign, Clark set about convincing McCarthy to enter theNew Hampshireprimary. McCarthy had initially planned to skip New Hampshire and begin campaigning inWisconsin. The case to run in New Hampshire was laid out by two members of the New Hampshire delegation of the Conference of Concerned Democrats:Dartmouth College officialDavid C. Hoeh andSt. Paul's School teacher (and future congressman)Gerry Studds. After more convincing from Clark, McCarthy decided that he would declare his entry to the New Hampshire primary. Hoeh and Studds took the titles of New Hampshire campaign director and coordinator, and Clark recruited the journalistSeymour Hersh to be McCarthy's press secretary.[6]
McCarthy's surprisingly strong showing in New Hampshire led to the rapid growth of his supporters, but the campaign was in increasing disarray. When SenatorRobert F. Kennedy entered the race as a second anti-war candidate, Clark and other McCarthy advisers initially tried to broker an agreement with Kennedy to meet head-to-head only in the California primary, with both campaigns supporting the winner of that primary, but McCarthy flatly rejected the proposal. Bitterness between the McCarthy and Kennedy campaigns only deepened after Johnson announced that he would not seek re-election andHubert Humphrey emerged as the choice of the Democratic establishment. In the wake of Kennedy's assassination the night that he won the California primary, many Kennedy delegates to the1968 Democratic National Convention refused to support McCarthy. McCarthy publicly conceded that Humphrey had enough delegates to win the nomination, a move that enraged Clark and other McCarthy supporters who felt that the candidate still had a chance of defeating Humphrey.[6]
Clark's sisterAnne Clark Martindell also attended the Democratic National Convention as a McCarthy supporter, launching her career in politics and public service. She would go on to serve in theNew Jersey Senate and asUnited States Ambassador to New Zealand.
Clark later became treasurer of the New Democratic Coalition, a group of disaffected liberals from the 1968 campaign. When theWatergate break-in occurred, Clark was theDemocratic National Committee's communications director.[5]
In 1941,[3] he was married to Jessie Holladay Philbin,[8] daughter of Jesse Holliday Philbin (d. 1978)[9] and granddaughter ofEugene A. Philbin (1857–1920), theNew York County District Attorney.[10] They had two children, Timothy B. Clark[7] and Cameron Clark.[11] The couple divorced in 1960.
Jessie Philbin remarried John Sumner Runnells James in 1965.[12] In 1971, Blair married his second wife Joanna (née Rostropowicz) Malinowski (b. 1939), who was born inWarsaw,Poland and was the daughter of Wladyslaw and Helena (née Baranski) Rostropowicz.[13] Joanna, the mother ofTomasz Malinowski (b. 1965), received aPhD from theUniversity of Pennsylvania and is a writer.[14] They had a son.[7]
In 2000, Clark died at his home inPrinceton, New Jersey at the age of 82.[4]
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