LORD BEAVERBROOK

Greymouth Evening Star, 8 December 1923, Page 8

LORD BEAVERBROOK

——— — NEWSPAPER MAGNATE'. The newspaper world in England was recently intensely interested in the purchase by Lord Rothermere of a group of influential newspapers at a cost of £6,000,000. It is now known that another great newspaper magnate—Lord Beaverbrook —was associated with Lord Rothermere in the great deal referred to. It is understood that Lord Beaverbrook, in addition to his successful control for a number of years of the Daily Express, with a circulation of a million copies, has now taken under his direct management the Evening Standard, and that following the big deal above referred to he purchased last month the Pall Mall Gazette. Lord Beaverbrook was during the war at the head of the Ministhy of Information, in which position he rendered conspicuous service to the Lloyd George Government. Of all the public men of the present day, it is doubtful if any has had a more romantic career than this young man, scarcely more than 40 years of age, who has already had three careers and succeeded magnificently in each of them (writes Mr. F. W. Doidge). Lord Beaverbrook’s father was a Presbyterian minister who went from Scotland to New Brunswick. As the family income was not a large one, young Max Aitken started work as a clerk at the age of 14. He had scarcely left his teens behind him when he embarked on his career as a financier. His rise was meteoric. He built miles of tramway lines, and several large water-power plants. He became the foremost industrial force in the country, and for a time dominated the industrial world of Canada. Within a space of ten years he had made two fortunes and had he decided to devote his whole career to money-making it is conceivable that he would by this time have been one of the richest men in the world.

Max Aitken, however, was made of finer stuff than that. A millionaire at the age of 30, he plunged into British politics. It is probably the life he loves best. He overthrew the Coalition Government of 1916, and brought Mr. Lloyd George into power. He realised one of the greatest joys of his career when his life-long friend, Mr. Bonar Law, became Prime Minister in 1922. As Minister for Information during the war he proved his great ability as an administrator. He lias refused more than one offer of a portfolio since. Not content with two careers, Lord Beaverbrook turned to a third. The Daily Express had had a thorny financial existence until Lord Beaverbrook entered into proprietorship. During the first two years of his association with the paper he had to put hundreds of thousands of pounds into its coffers to keep it alive. Within a period of five years he turned it into a great national journal with a million readers—and able to pay its own way. He established the Sunday Express, and confounded the critics by proving that a half million readers could be found for a clean Sunday newspaper. And now we are all a-flutter with

the news of his new coup—tlie greatest of its kind the newspaper world has even known. One reason why Lord Beaverbrook’s growing! power in Fleet Street should be welcomed is because he is not in the newspaper business to make money. He emphasised this fact recently!, when making an after-luncheon speech at the Hotel Cecil. To the paper worker the newsvendor, and the’ general public, this is good news. Lord Beaverbrook is not in the newspaper business for what he can get out of it. So much for the career of this remarkable man. What of the man himself? ft has been my privilege to know him intimately for a number of years. His public photographs always belie him, in that they give the impression of a man metallic hard. On the contrary, he is intensely human, and extraordinarily soft-hearted. He has the figure of a boy, kept lithesome by constant exercise. And he has all the boy’s love of fun. His eyes fairly sparkle with merriment, and he has the friendliest smile of any man I know. Here is a man who

is frankly glad to be alive; who gets an intense joy out of work, and a full meed of pleasure out of play. And he radiates energy. After an hour in his company one goes away with the feeling of having been completely revitalised. I think he could galvanise a glacier into action if he tried. His personality is dynamic, his brain power enormous. He excels in the capacity to “think straight.” He is a man who always wants facts. To offer him a half-truth is to seek annihilation. Perhaps a little incident I can recall will serve to give an insight into the character of the man. Whatever he does, he does well. Fie plays tennis like a demon, and he dances superbly. Last year, when the season was at its height, I arrived at Deauville. It was midnight—Deauville’s dizziest and most delirious hour. I was shown up to Lord Beaverbrook’s bedroom. The son of the Scottish

The book was entitled “The Life of Jesus.”