Hearst Corporation The Hearst Corporation is an American mass media group based in the Hearst Tower , Manhattan in New York City , New York , United States . Founded by William Randolph Hearst as an owner of newspaper s , the company ' s holdings now include a wide variety of media . The Hearst family is involved in the ownership and management of the company . Hearst is one of the largest diversified communications companies in the world . Its major interests include 15 daily and 36 weekly newspapers , and more than 300 magazines around the world , including " Harper ' s Bazaar " , " Cosmopolitan " , " Esquire " , " Elle " and " O , The Oprah Magazine " ; 29 television stations through Hearst Television Inc . which reach a combined 18 % of U . S . viewers ; ownership in leading cable networks , including A + E Networks , and ESPN Inc . ; as well as business publishing , Internet businesses , television production , newspaper features distribution and real estate . Trustees of William Randolph Hearst ' s will . Under William Randolph Hearst ' s will , a common board of thirteen trustees ( its composition fixed at five family members and eight outsiders ) administers the Hearst Foundation , the William Randolph Hearst Foundation , and the trust that owns ( and selects the 22 - member board of ) the Hearst Corporation . The foundations shared ownership until tax law changed to prevent this . As of 2012 , the trustees are : The trust dissolves when all family members alive at the time of Hearst ' s death in August 1951 have died . History . George Hearst ( 1820 – 1891 ) , American publisher and U . S . senator , entered the newspaper business in 1880 , acquiring the " San Francisco Daily Examiner . " Seven years later he turned the " Examiner " over to his son , 23 - year - old William Randolph Hearst . On March 4 , 1887 William Randolph Hearst became editor and publisher of the " San Francisco Examiner " and transformed the sedate Examiner into " The Monarch of the Dailies . " He acquired the most advanced printing equipment of his day , substantially revised the newspaper ’ s appearance and hired the best journalists he could find . He pushed his staff to write exciting news stories , and wrote editorials worded with force and conviction that enlivened the paper . Within a few years , the new " Examiner " was a success . In 1895 Hearst purchased the " New York Journal , " laying the foundation for one of the major newspaper dynasties in American history . Hearst experimented with every aspect of newspaper publishing , from page layouts to editorial crusades . His newspapers introduced innovations such as multi - color presses , halftone photographs on newsprint , comic sections printed in color and wire syndication of news copy . Stories by Hearst correspondents from around the world were sold to other newspapers , giving rise to the Hearst International News Service , which later merged with the United Press and became part of United Press International , the main competitor to the Associated Press . Hearst Magazines was begun in 1903 with the publication of " Motor " magazine . Within the next 10 years Hearst acquired several popular titles in 1905 , starting with " Cosmopolitan " , and " Good Housekeeping " in 1911 . Hearst began producing newsreels in the mid - 1910 ' s , creating one of the earliest animation studios ; the International Film Service . While the studio folded quickly , Hearst would regularly make film adaptations of his comic strips in collaboration with Hollywood studios until the late 1950 ' s , though most of them have become lost films as those had to be destroyed after ten years after their release ; a precautionary measure done by Hearst in case the films didn ' t do well , to minimize the impact of any flop on the comic ' s popularity . In the 1920s and 1930 ' s Hearst had the biggest media conglomerate in the world . Apart from having highly - circulated magazines and owning 28 newspapers in 18 major cities from coast to coast ( many of them under either the " American " or " Examiner " banners ) read by one out of four Americans each day , Hearst also began acquiring radio stations to complement his papers , in 1929 Hearst along with movie studio Metro Goldwyn Mayer created " Hearst Metrotone " to produce newsreels shown in movie theatres filled with news footage shot around the world , and in 1947 he produced an early television newscast for the DuMont Television Network : I . N . S . Telenews , becoming the owner of one of the first television stations in the country , WBAL - TV in Baltimore one year later . However the Great Depression hit him hard , forcing Hearst to sell the " Washington Times - Herald " to the McCormick - Patterson owners of the " Chicago Tribune " in the early 1930 ' s and merging most of his remaining papers late in the decade . The latter decision proved to be fatal for Hearst ' s media empire as most of them became afternoon papers . However this was seen as a profitable idea in pre - television days as evening newspapers often outsold their morning counterparts as these featured updated stock market information in early editions , while later editions were heavy on sporting news with results of baseball games and horse races . Afternoon papers also benefited from continuous reports from the battlefront during World War II . After the war however , both television news and suburbs had an explosive growth ; thus , evening papers were more affected than the ones published in the morning , whose circulation kept stable while their afternoon counterparts ' sales plummeted . Another major blow was the fact that by the late 1950 ' s football and baseball games were being played later in the afternoon and now stretched through early in the evening , disabling papers to publish results in decent selling hours . The earnings of Hearst ' s three morning papers , the " San Francisco Examiner " , the " Los Angeles Examiner " and " The Milwaukee Sentinel " had to finance the money - losing afternoon " Los Angeles Herald - Express " , the " New York Journal - American " and the " Chicago Herald - American " ( 1939 merger of the " Herald - Examiner " and the " American " ) , sold in 1956 to the " Chicago Tribune " ' s owners ( who continued it and later changed to a tabloid " Chicago Today " in 1969 , closed 1974 ) , while the " Milwaukee Sentinel " was sold and merged with the afternoon " Milwaukee Journal " in 1962 after a lengthy strike , the same year Hearst ' s L . A . papers were merged ; the morning " Examiner " and the afternoon " Herald - Express " into the evening " Los Angeles Herald - Examiner " , causing a strike which lasted fifteen years , beginning at the same time that another strike had New York City also with no papers , which ended up sinking the company at a faster pace . Beginning in 1965 , the Hearst Corporation began recurring to Joint Operating Agreement s , with the first one reached with the DeYoung family , proprietors of the afternoon " San Francisco Chronicle " , which began to produce a joint Sunday edition with the " Examiner " . The following year , the " Journal - American " reached another JOA with another two landmark NYC papers ; the " Herald - Tribune " and Scripps - Howard ' s " World - Telegram and Sun " to form the " New York World Journal Tribune " , ( recalling the names of the city ' s oldest hoariest dailies ) which unfortunately collapsed after only a few months . The company sold the " Boston Herald Traveler " and " Boston Record American " which had been merged in 1972 to all - day publication to the " Boston Herald American " to Australian Rupert Murdoch ' s News Corporation in 1982 , which promptly renamed the paper to one of its predecessors , " The Boston Herald " to continue to compete with the morning " Boston Globe " ; closed " The News American " in Baltimore ( 113 years old ) in 1986 , after a failed attempt to get a joint operating agreement with the A . S . Abell Company , family publishers of The Baltimore Sun ( which coincidentally sold its paper several days later to the Times Mirror syndicate of the Chandlers ' Los Angeles Times ; The LAT ' s afternoon competitor " Los Angeles Herald - Examiner " was folded in 1989 ; with the " San Antonio Light " going dark in 1993 . Hearst Corp . pulled a surprising " switcheroo " in 2000 and sold its flagship and " Monarch of the Dailies " , the afternoon " San Francisco Examiner " after it acquired the long - time competing but larger in the morning " San Francisco Chronicle " published by the de Young family , leaving the " Albany Times - Union " as the only remaining Hearst paper from its golden age owned by the company . William Hearst died in 1951 at age 88 , and was succeeded by Richard E . Berlin as chief executive officer ; Berlin had served as president of the company since 1943 . Berlin retired in 1973 . Frank Massi , a longtime Hearst financial officer , served as president from 1973 to 1975 , carrying out a financial reorganization followed by an expansion program in the late 1970s . John R . Miller was Hearst president and chief executive officer from 1975 to 1979 . On November 8 , 1990 Hearst Corporation acquired the remaining 20 % stake of ESPN Inc . from RJR Nabisco for a price estimated between $ 165 million and $ 175 million . The other 80 % has been owned by The Walt Disney Company since 1996 . In December 2003 Marvel Entertainment acquired Cover Concepts from Hearst Communications , Inc . On August 27 , 2009 A + E Networks acquired Lifetime Entertainment Services . In 2011 Hearst absorbed more than 100 magazine titles from the Lagardere group for more than $ 700 million and became a challenger of Time Inc ahead of Condé Nast . Citizen Hearst . Citizen Hearst is 2012 American documentary film about William Randolph Hearst and Hearst Corp . The film is directed by Leslie Iwerks and narrated by William H . Macy . It is produced by Leslie Iwerks and Jane Kelly Kosek . The movie made its premiere at the Hamptons International Film Festival on October 5 , 2012 . Assets . A non - exhaustive list of its properties and investments includes : Antitrust allegations . On July 14 , 2006 , San Francisco businessman and real estate investor Clint Reilly filed a lawsuit against Hearst Corp . ( owner of the " San Francisco Chronicle " ) and MediaNews Group ( owner of the " San Jose Mercury News " , " Contra Costa Times " , " Marin Independent Journal " , " Oakland Tribune " and all other paid - circulation dailies in the Bay Area ) , alleging that the two companies have been conspiring to control advertising rates , a violation of antitrust laws . In November 2006 , Reilly ' s attorney presented to U . S . District Judge Susan Illston a letter from Hearst senior vice president James Asher to MediaNews President Jody Lodovic that said the two companies agreed to " offer national advertising and internet advertising sales for their San Francisco Bay area newspapers on a joint basis , and to consolidate the San Francisco Bay Area distribution networks of such newspapers . . . " Illston , suggesting she had been misled by the companies when they said they had not been collaborating , issued a 14 - page ruling forbidding Hearst and MediaNews from working together on national advertising sales or distribution . On December 21 , 2006 , the San Francisco Bay Guardian and nonprofit Media Alliance filed suit to make the details of Reilly ' s lawsuit — and MediaNews and the Chronicle ' s response — public . As a result of the filing , many documents in the case were voluntarily disclosed by the defendants . The judge allowed redacted versions of two more documents to be released . She kept 17 others under seal . One of the documents unsealed was the deposition of Hearst ' s Asher , who says that as of September 2006 , his company had recorded cumulative losses of $ 330 million on its investment in the Chronicle , which it acquired in mid - 2000 . He said Hearst proposed selling the Chronicle to MediaNews , but MediaNews didn ' t offer enough money . Asher also said Hearst and MediaNews have discussed working together for years . Although the trial was scheduled to start Monday , April 30 , 2007 in U . S . District Court in San Francisco , the parties announced on April 25 , 2007 that a settlement had been reached .