The Press: Loeb Blow

In both front-page editorials and news stories, the Manchester, N.H., Union Leader has savaged a long list of public figures in the 19 years that it has been owned by Publisher William Loeb.

The paper’s targets have included Dwight Eisenhower (“that stinking hypocrite”), John Kennedy (“the No. 1 liar in the U.S.A.”), Henry Kissinger (“Kissinger the Kike”) and Edmund Muskie, who was driven to tears—and a fatally poor showing—during the state’s 1972 presidential primary by a Union Leader description of his wife Jane as a heavy drinker with a fondness for gamy jokes.

Loeb and his paper, which is the only statewide daily (circ. 63,750) in New Hampshire, have powerfully influenced everything in the state from elections to the slogan on its license plates (“Live Free or Die”). As contenders in next month’s New Hampshire primary will probably learn, William Loeb, 70, is a mean man to cross.

That fact has not daunted Kevin Cash, 49, a Manchester native who has worked as a reporter and rewrite man at one time or another on a dozen or so newspapers, including Loeb’s own Union Leader. Cash has written and published a devastating 472-page biography of his old boss entitled Who the Hell IS William Loeb?(Amoskeag Press, $8.95; paperbound, $5.95).

The book sold 10,000 copies in the first nine days after it appeared in November; since then, 20,000 more copies have been distributed, and a third printing of 20,000 came off the presses last week.

Those are impressive sales figures in a state that has only 791,000 people (the book is not yet generally available outside New Hampshire). Says Don Alper, a bookseller in Bedford (pop.

5,859) who sold 137 copies in two hours:

“Up here it is going faster than The Pentagon Papers, The White House Transcripts, Helter Skelter or any other book in my experience.”

Cash’s tale reads like a Granite State Citizen Kane, a long, picaresque account of Loeb divorces, extramarital affairs, lawsuits, financial intrigues and editorial vendettas. Cash says that in 1946 Loeb borrowed $250,000 from his mother, the widow of Teddy Roosevelt’s personal secretary, to buy into the Union Leader, but later became embroiled hi a court fight with her over use of the funds. Cash also recounts the story of the night that Loeb spent in jail on an alienation of affections charge (settled out of court, although Cash insists Loeb was guilty), and the day he pulled out a pistol and shot the office cat dead. Loeb later told employees, through a spokesman, that the cat was suffering a convulsion and he wanted to put it out of its misery.

In one passage, Cash describes in detail how as a young man Superpatriot Loeb fought repeated attempts by the draft board in Oyster Bay, N.Y., the town where he grew up, to induct him during World War II; Loeb finally won his battle when he found a sympathetic Vermont doctor who helped him win a 4-F classification for ulcers. “Loeb is a bully,” says Monsignor Philip Kenney, vicar of community affairs for the ManChester diocese. “A lot of people who have been duped by him should read this book.” Adds former New Hampshire Governor Walter Peterson, whose teenage daughter suffered an emotional breakdown after Loeb vilified her for an innocent remark about marijuana use: “Kevin Cash has performed a significant public service.”

That the book made it into print at all is a minor miracle. Loeb has a reputation for launching libel actions at the drop of a pejorative: New Times and the Boston Globe are currently facing Loeb suits totaling $7.5 million. Eleven publishers shied away from Cash’s manuscript, and three libel insurance firms refused to underwrite his possible legal defense costs. Cash finally formed his own publishing house, Amoskeag Press, Inc. (from an old Indian name for the

Manchester area), and incorporated it in Delaware to make it harder for Loeb to sue. Still, four New Hampshire printing firms would not touch the book, and Cash had to go to Vermont for a printer.

The Union Leader has refused to run advertisements for the biography. It is no secret around New Hampshire that Cash once had a drinking problem and was dismissed by the Union Leader in 1959. “Nobody ever drank more than Kevin—he was a real newspaperman,” says Jimmy Breslin, an old colleague from Cash’s Herald Tribune days, who encouraged him in the project. Cash readily admits that he was fired—for showing up drunk to cover a golf match —but swears he has not had a drink in two years. Says he: “I gave up everything for this. I thought it was about time somebody stood up to this guy.”

What such effrontery will cost Cash is unclear. Cash has sent Loeb a copy of the book, but the publisher declines to comment. Says Loeb: “The only response we make will be in court.”