The Press: Gorty Up

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For 20 years Joseph Vincent Connolly plugged for Hearst, always hard, sometimes brilliantly. He signed up Bob ("Believe It Or Not") Ripley, saw that Popeye starred in Elzie Segar's comic strip Thimble Theatre, sent H. R. Knickerbocker to Vladivostok in 1931 because Knickerbocker, long before it broke, smelled an Incident in Manchuria.

Reward last year for Joe Connolly's loyalty was a $65,000 job as general man ager of Hearst Consolidated Publications, Inc. But there was a catch in the job: Hearst's empire was tottering. Hearst was getting on and Joe Connolly was expected to get the empire in order before the old man died. He amputated radio stations, shuffled executives, chopped the Chicago Herald and Examiner down to tabloid size. But Connolly could not be everywhere at once. When the Herex and Chicago American units of the American Newspaper Guild struck, Connolly put his cool, alert assistant, Jacob ("Gorty") Gortatowsky, at the conference table.

Last fortnight, his health cracked at 44, Joe Connolly called it quits and resigned. To replace him, in came Gortatowsky. Gorty had started 33 years ago as an unpaid cub on the Atlanta Constitution. When Hearst's King Features summoned him 22 years later he was the Constitution's managing editor. He moved steadily up through the complicated Hearst hierarchy, seemed to have reached a blind alley when he became chronic assistant general manager. But last week he had moved up again.

As with Joe Connolly, one of Gorty's biggest immediate problems was the struck Herex (now merged with the American). When Gorty sat down with the Newspaper Guild in Chicago last July, he let it be known that he was no Guild-hater. Guildsmen watched him chain-smoke 50¢ Corona Coronas, called him a "nice guy . . . reasonable . . . calm. "Last week they hoped that Gorty would be the man to settle the longest strike (one year old on Dec. 5) the Guild has ever had.