This story originally ran in April, 2009. Ms. Ruth Holmberg passed away on Wednesday, April 19.
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Despite having served as publisher of the Chattanooga Times, Ruth Holmberg considers planting trees in downtown Chattanooga her greatest contribution so far.
“I think it is a very pretty city and I believe in trees,” she said in an honest manner.
Mrs. Holmberg has tried to bloom where planted as well since moving to Chattanooga from her native New York. Through her longtime former role as publisher and her civic leadership on various community boards, she has been a pioneer in supporting by voice or example such progressive issues as social tolerance, women in leadership, and nature and the arts.
As she candidly reminisced about her career recently, she admitted that she is not sure what the future holds for the traditional printed newspaper in the age of the World Wide Web.
“I think it is awfully tough trying to accommodate a new medium,” she said. “And, of course, the recession hasn’t helped matters, either. It is a tough time to be in almost any business.
“But I think for my generation and the next generation, there will be newspapers,” she continued. “But I think there are going to be fewer newspapers.”
To say Mrs. Holmberg has printer’s ink in her blood is not an exaggeration, as her grandfather, the famous publisher Adlolph Ochs, built both the Chattanooga Times and the New York Times into successful and formidable operations.
The New York Times grew to become, in many people’s minds, the nation’s most respected newspaper.
As a young girl born in the 1920s, Mrs. Holmberg saw first hand the important position Mr. Ochs had. However, the most important position he held in her eyes was as her doting grandfather.
As a daughter of Mr. Ochs’ only child, Iphigene Bertha Ochs Sulzberger, Mrs. Holmberg enjoyed plenty of time with Mr. Ochs.
“He was a very loving grandfather and he adored his grandchildren,” she said. “He played games with us and sang songs with us.
“Of course, he was occupied, but he always took time for us.”
Although he spent most of his later years in New York, Mr. Ochs always told people Chattanooga was his hometown, she said. He had taken Mrs. Holmberg’s older sister, Marian, to visit Chattanooga in 1935 and was eating with some old friends at a Fountain Square restaurant when he suddenly died while sitting in his chair.
“If you have to die, that was a good way,” she said.
As an adult, Mrs. Holmberg moved to Chattanooga, where she headed up the Times with her two husbands, the late Ben Hale Golden and the late William Holmberg.
During the turbulent decades of the mid-20th century, the Times was known for its editorial support of liberal or progressive issues.
“We helped bring about a peaceful desegregation,” she said. “We supported desegregation from the very beginning. We also supported liquor by the drink and it changed the face of Chattanooga as far as restaurants are concerned. It helped tourism.
“I would like to say we were on the right side of all the issues,” she added with a laugh.
Despite the paper’s strong and now-respected stand on certain issues, the paper for several decades did struggle to compete in circulation with the Chattanooga News-Free Press.
The Free Press hustled just as much to get the news, and it also offered plenty of local feature stories and photographs. Also, editor Lee Anderson’s editorials were more in line with the conservative political, social and religious outlook within the Chattanooga community.
The brilliant businessman running the Free Press was, of course, Roy McDonald, who had broken away from a joint publishing arrangement with the Times in the mid-1960s.
“He was a very formidable opponent,” Mrs. Holmberg recalled. “It was a very contentious relationship. It wasn’t very friendly, not for a long time.”
As a result of the circulation, financial and emotional challenges, the Times in the early 1980s entered into another joint operating agreement in which the Free Press would handle the printing, circulation and advertising aspects of the Times. In return, the Times would not publish a Sunday paper.
“I don’t think anything that costly and difficult was good competition,” Mrs. Holmberg said. “Creating the publishing company was the right thing to do rather than do daily battle. The only people who benefited from competition were the readers.”
The joint operating agreement was in effect until Walter Hussman purchased the Free Press and the Times in 1998. Now, Mrs. Holmberg enjoys a more leisurely pace, although she is still a speaker or civic volunteer in demand.
“I am retired from the paper completely,” she said. “I am just involved with community boards.”
She is also still quite a walking history book, both through her memories of her famous grandfather and her own experiences heading the Times through such an interesting time.
johnshearer1@icloud.com