Who owns paddock publications

He maintained ownership until , when he sold his interests to his sons Charles and Stuart. Paddock continued to serve as a senior editor until just days before his death at the age of 83 in Charles Paddock was in charge of production operations, while brother Stuart was responsible for editorial and business promotion operations.

Stuart's sons, Stuart, Jr. As boy, Stuart, Jr. After graduating from Knox College in , he was hesitant about joining the family business, concerned that it was not large enough to support him and his siblings. Instead, he elected to strike out on his own, hitchhiking to California to find a job. He eventually found himself in Cheyenne, Wyoming, where he spent his last nickel on a sweet roll.

Afraid to ride freight trains with the unsavory hobos he encountered, he decided to hitchhike either east or west, depending upon chance to determine which direction he would take. Stuart became an assistant editor as well as a bookkeeper. After a stint in the service during World War II, he once again returned to the company, becoming a board director in Younger brother Robert also earned a degree from Knox, graduating in With Stuart in the military, he shouldered a number of responsibilities during the war in addition to his primary role as a sports editor.

Margie also went to work for the family enterprise, becoming involved in advertising, and was eventually named a vice-president and assistant treasurer of the corporation. Paddock Publications was content to remain a collection of small weekly newspapers until , when the Chicago Sun-Times , owned by the heirs of tycoon Marshall Field, launched a suburban daily, The Day.

By this time, Stuart Paddock, Sr. With Charles' death in and Stuart's in , it was left to a third generation of the Paddock family to meet the challenge of The Day. Stuart Paddock, Jr. He shared ownership of the company with his brother and sister. A close-knit family, they worked together in running Paddock Publications over the ensuing years. In the short term, The Day soon proved to be a major threat to the very existence of the company.

Despite increasing the publication frequency of the company's newspapers to three times a week, circulation declined by 40 percent within three years, dipping below 20, Matters grew so dire at one point that the company was unable to pay Stuart Paddock, Jr. As he later told an interviewer, "We either had to go daily or die.

The fortunes of the company quickly reversed, and little more than a year later management of The Day decided to quit the field, selling out to Paddock Publications.

In order to finance the deal, the Paddocks had to bring in some outside investors, who then advised them to sell the operation and turn a tidy profit. Instead, the Paddocks began to buy back the stock, which they eventually put to use in an employee retirement trust. In , Paddock Publications also entered Lake County, where a number of community weekly papers were established.

While the Herald began to enjoy steady growth as a daily, the prospects for newspapers in Chicago were not as bright in the early s. Combined circulation topped 2. By the mids, only two papers remained in business, the Sun-Times and the Tribune , with a total circulation of less than 1. The new battleground for subscribers lay in the suburbs, where Paddock Publications was well entrenched. In , a Saturday edition was added to its daily newspaper; in , the Arlington Heights Herald changed its name to The Daily Herald ; and in , a Sunday edition was introduced, making Paddock a major force in the Chicago suburbs.

The Lake County weekly papers then went daily in The Herald launched a number of zoned editions targeting individual communities featuring at least one local lead story each day. We think we and management will work to continue the good business and journalistic role we have in our communities, with us being two among many employee stockholders," he said. Stuart Paddock said in a statement: "As the communities we serve have grown and prospered, so has the family business.

To Bob Paddock and myself, it is most important that the culture of family ownership, the thriving standard of excellence we reach for every day and our integrity is preserved through future generations. There is no better owner we can think of to accomplish this than the very employees responsible for our historic success. While we will still come to work every day, we are proud and satisfied knowing our traditions will continue well into the future. Ray said no changes were planned in the way the company operates -- including its board of directors and management.

We'll keep doing the same kind of work, and I'm confident we'll be one of the winners after this is all played out. Calling it "one of those win-win situations in our business," Ray said of the ownership change: "I suspect it will be the envy of the industry, and certainly the employees in our industry. This is a way to continue on in the same fashion that we've been operating the business for generations.

We could not contemplate this kind of transaction if we were not doing well. I think it's a good day for Paddock Publications. Paddock family selling year stake in Daily Herald to newspaper employees. Robert Feder. Related Coverage. Related Article Editorial: The Paddock heritage. Related Article The newspaper legacy the Paddocks leave: Fearing God, telling the truth, making money. The descendants of patriarch and founder Hosea C. Paddock are selling their interest in the parent company of the Daily Herald, which is expected to convert to full employee ownership before the end of the year.

In addition to the Daily Herald, Paddock Publications operates the monthly Daily Herald Business Ledger, the weekly Reflejos Spanish-language publication, a group of small downstate newspapers throughout Illinois, a commercial publishing business and a growing list of niche publications.

This ESOP transaction is designed to continue our family-oriented legacy and importantly to build upon a successful and sustainable business model driven by employee owners. It marks the end of an era of Paddock family ownership of the company that began in when Hosea C. Paddock, an entrepreneurial editor, bought the Palatine Enterprise and soon added weekly newspapers in Arlington Heights, Bensenville, Itasca and elsewhere. Through four generations, the company has remained in the family — until now.