Medford mail tribune., April 22, 1962, Image 34

The Newspapers That
Fought City Hall
By JACK RYAN
The risks were great violence, Joss of business, crushing defeat;
the possible reward a clean city; these men chose to take the risks
Editors' Notet This week the 75th anniversary of the
American Newspaper Publishers Association comes to a
climax as the group holds its annual convention in New
York City. In tribute to the ANPA, Family Weekly pre
sents this dramatic example of how newspapers and citizen
action can bring about better government.
The story happened in Utica, N.Y., and though it is
familiar to Uticans it is being retold to Family Weekly's
5V2 million readers across the country.
NEAL BiNTZ, managing editor of the Utica
Daily Press, picked up a jangling tele
phone one damp spring day in 1958.
"This is just to tell you," a muffled voice said, "that
you're going to get a working over if you keep printing
those crime stories." The caller rang off before the startled
editor could reply.
At almost the same moment, in another part of the city,
the wife of Gil Smith, managing editor of the Utica 06-server-Dispatch,
opened an envelope without a return ad
dress. What she read left her ashen. The letter was an
obscene tirade with threats directed against her husband.
She forwarded it to the police and wondered if they
could be relied upon to protect her family.
A few nights later, Mason C. Taylor, executive editor of
the morning and evening sister papers, heard an intruder
jimmying the back door of his home. Armed with a No. 5
golf iron and mindful of violent threats against his staff,
he crept into the darkened kitchen. The intruder, however,
fled into the darkness. "Just a kid prowling," he told his
wife and hoped that he was right.
At an editorial meeting the next day, the newsmen
agreed that the threats added up to one thing. "We've fi
nally got them worried," Taylor said, grimly aware of the
irony of his remark. "But who are 'they'?"
Utica, a peaceful city of 100,000, once known as a textile
center, had gone through a "loom to boom" transition after
World War II. Preoccupied with jobs in new industries,
new homes, and raising families, its residents had become
apathetic toward police laxity, political bossism, gambling,
and growing corruption. Their newspapers had warned of
these things, but no one seemed to be listening.
Then came the state police raid on the famous "summit
meeting" of alleged Mafia leaders at Apalachin, N.Y.,
during which three Uticans were seized. Investigators
speculated that Utica may have become upstate headquar
ters for a national crime syndicate.
The papers launched a no-holds-barred attack on prosti
tution, gambling, and the apathy of public officials. At first,
city hall, vice lords, and the gamblers laughed it off. By
May, 1958, the laughs had turned to threats.
"We weren't sure at first whether big-time hoods had
moved in or we were dealing with local muscle," said Tay
lor. "Our best guess was that the syndicate had started to
take over but the nationwide crackdown after Apalachin
had sent them to cover. Apparently we guessed right."
The police chief retired, after admitting to a legislative
committee he had never raided a disorderly house in his
20 years of service. His deputy resigned.
The bosses countered by hitting at the newspapers' life
blood advertising. They tried to organize a merchants'
boycott. "They're giving Utica a bad name," the bosses
told businessmen. The boycott failed. So did attempts to
bring a Justice Department antitrust suit against the pa
pers. Next came a proposed tax on advertising, so blatantly
punitive it was howled down.
WHEN reporters Jack Germond, Tony Vella, and Wil
liam Lohden began probing municipal purchasing,
officials cried, "You're disrupting office routine," and
sought to bar them. They persisted, and found that while
the city was buying truck tires in large volume at above
retail prices, they weren't showing up on city vehicles.
Private firms were being paid as much as $10 a car space
to clear snow from parking areas. Payrolls were loaded
with drones, politicians' relatives, and cronies.
The hornets' nest stirred by the newspapers and a re
sulting grand-jury investigation convinced Averell Harri
man, then governor, that Utica needed a special prosecutor
to supplant the local district attorney. He appointed Robert
E. Fischer; top investigator for Fischer was Sgt. Ed Cros
well, who had gained fame as the raider of the Apalachin
mobster meeting.
Fischer's investigators blanketed Utica, and what they
found in courtroom evidence vindicated the bitter fight of
the two newspapers. The deputy chief of police, a captain,
and three detectives were fingered by prostitutes (who also
said they themselves had contributed handsomely to politi
cal fund raising) in conspiring to protect brothels and
were convicted. Fischer's men also swooped down on bookie
joints, and operators were caught with receipts in hand.
Thwarted in all their reprisals, the political bosses
banked on their machine winning the November election,
as it had for 14 years.
But a group of "young Turks," moved to action by the
(Continued on page 10)
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