Sigh of Relief in Toledo

A stalemated strike that has kept Toledo’s two newspapers, the morning Times and the afternoon Blade, shut down for nearly five months, was finally settled last week. Not that the two sides had ever been all that far apart. The unions were asking for a two-year contract with a $24-a-week raise; the company offered a 28-month contract with a $20 raise.

Bitterness was the problem. Bargaining sessions produced only fits of temper. Negotiations were derailed at one critical point when the crusty publisher of the papers, Paul Block Jr., denounced the Newspaper Guild for taking scholarship money from the CIA. The only bright spot was a remarkably professional daily paper that the unions put out on a collection of antiquated presses; it reached a circulation of 80,-000 and was actually making money. Agreement, when it came, was a result less of bargaining than of mutual wearing-down. It reportedly provided for a two-year contract and a $21 raise. Now the unions must ratify the contract.