PROSPECTUS OF Illustrated Daily News Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jr., Publisher GREATER LOS ANGELES One Cent a Copy The World’s News in Pictures This prospectus is only about one-fourth the size of the Illustrated Daily News.Foreword FOR the past three years I have been making an intensive study of the newspapers of Europe and the United States, having also acted as special correspondent for some of the leading newspapers of the world. During that same period, I have been carefully selecting from the personnel of the best publications, a staff of leading journalists —men who understand every phase in the building and pro- duction of a great newspaper. I have undertaken the publication of a new daily morning newspaper along new lines and have selected Los Angeles as the place in all America as offering not only the most favorable opportunities but as being a better field than any large city in the country for an INDEPENDENT, CLEAN, FEARLESS morning newspaper. My mechanical equipment for the publication of this new morning newspaper is ready and can be gotten into action within a short time. The location for its temporary publication, until a suitable building can be built, is already provided for. With the aid of a staff of the most experienced and successful newspaper men obtainable, I hope to give to Greater Los Angeles a new morning newspaper that will stand first, last and all the time for the interests of this great community and of Southern California and the people who compose its population, and that will find a welcome in every home, inspire the confidence of its readers and become a powerful constructive force. This newspaper will be an illustrated daily at lc per copy with special and very beautifully illustrated extra editions, in addition to the regular morning edition. It will picture the news and happenings locally, nationally and internationally by actual photographs each day and carry special features and a complete news service. The photographic services will be the very best obtainable.Subscription and Ballot June. 1923. CORNELIUS VANDERBILT, JR., Union Bank Building־, Eighth & Hill Sts., Los Angeles, Calif. Enclosed find my 16™note106 for $5, payment in advance for one year’s subscription to the Illustrated Daily News, to be delivered to my address given below. Under the terms of your offer, I am to be registered with the trustee as one of the beneficiaries of the trust of 51% of the net declared earnings of your publishing company, owning and publishing the News, and to the right of voting in the election of two of the managing directors, under the terms of the trust indenture governing this trust. If this subscription is rejected by you, my remittance is to be returned, and you reserve the right of rejection or acceptance for any reason satisfactory to you. I understand that I am not making any investment whatever and that the beneficiary interest in net earnings is a gift from you, not transferable, or assignable and is subject to the terms of the trusteeship when established. Signature........................-............................ P. 0. Address..........................City................... BALLOT If my above subscription is accepted, I cast my vote for the following named as two of the first board of managers. ..............................of.............................. .......................of............................. If not convenient to remit the $5.00, sign the note below. $5.00 NOTE ...................... - ........, June......, 1923. For value received I promise to pay to Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jr., or order, thirty days from date hereof, the sum of FIVE DOLLARS at the Union Bank & Trust Company, Los Angeles. Signature.................-..........-..........-......-....... P. O. Address..........................City....................SUGGESTIONS FOR THE Illustrated Daily News NOTE: You are invited to make any suggestions in connection with the Illustrated Daily News when sending in your subscription and ballot and they will be deeply appreciated. CORNELIUS VANDERBILT, JR., Illustrated Daily News, Los Angeles, California. I have the following suggestions to make in connection with the publishing of the Illustrated Daily News: Signature................................................... Address.....................................................Picture-minded PICTURES are the oldest means and language employed by the human race in communicating ideas and information. They are £he universal language. Modern developments of photography, including the moving picture, and the world-wide ramifications of photographic services, have now made opportune the publication of a great daily pictorial newspaper. The public has become picture-minded. A glance at an actual photograph of an event will convey a clearer and far quicker understanding of it than the columns of printed matter that are usually written to fill space. There can be condensed into a newspaper page of actual photographs and their underlines, more actual news and information of what has happened than can be gleaned from many pages of type. Leading articles, world and local news items, special features and departments will be given ample space, but the dominating feature of this newspaper will be the daily portrayal of local, national and world news by means of actual photographs. I have planned for the transmission of photographs by means of aerial mail service, assuring the receipt of photographs from many parts of America and Europe, much more quickly than by mail. Locally, I shall employ a large staff of camera men and trained newspaper men. There will be a number of most interesting, useful and novel features carried in the pages of this paper, including an unrivaled comic section, household and fashion pages, sports and children’s pages, also the most complete harbor and shipping news, etc. In addition to photos supplied each day by our special service and by the regularly employed photographic staff, photographs sent in by others, if of sufficient news value or general interest will be paid for liberally. This will •reinforce our own facilities by inducing the public to contribute photos of special interest and merit.The Camera Tells the News of the DayA Page for Those Who Love SportsIllustrated Daily News THE above is the name of the new morning newspaper and it will fully live up to its name. We are going to try to give you the most modern and in every way the most desirable home newspaper, that money, organization, experience, equipment and the will-to-serve can produce. Having carefully observed and noted, through exceptional facilities for so doing, the most successful newspapers of the world from the INSIDE, I have noted with intense interest, the astounding reception that has recently been given a new daily newspaper in New York City, published along similar lines. This paper was at first given but slight attention and had to overcome the combined resistance of the established newspapers, but in a few months it had reached a daily circulation of over SIX HUNDRED THOUSAND COPIES, the largest daily ciradation of any New York newspaper and is now making a great profit. This convinced me that I was on the right track. For a long time I have been making the necessary preparations, lining up the photo services and arranging many other details for such a daily illustrated newspaper as has not yet been produced west of New York. I have selected Greater Los Angeles as the one community in all America offering the best field and the most intelligent and appreciative clientele. Furthermore, I am quite confident that there is ample room here for a morning newspaper absolutely independent and not controlled by any faction, party or interest, provided the public believes in this policy and will support it. The ultimate possibilities of such a journal will be limited only by the confidence it can inspire and the service it can render for the public good in this, the most wonderful and the most progressive community in the world. As regards the destiny of Greater Los Angeles, the fact that I have selected it as the place in which to undertake the very great financial and other investment required in this enterprise, should be a sufficient guarantee of my sincerity.The Problems THE mechanical, financial, editorial and other physical problems of starting and building up such a newspaper as I propose, are matters subject to careful calculation, estimate and provision therefor. There is one special problem, however, that is different and this deals with people’s minds, heart, confidence and goodwill and outweighs all the others. A newspaper is created afresh, daily. Each issue is in itself a creation of men’s minds and must reflect them. Sooner or later the secret forces controlling it will, in spite of themselves, become manifest and cannot for long be successfully hidden. Then that newspaper will either grow in strength or lose the confidence and goodwill of the public, although it may maintain its circulation to a degree by main force and its ability to keep rivals out of the field. I am painfully aware that my great-great-grandfather, Commodore Vanderbilt once voiced a sentiment, at that time quite prevalent among so-called captains of finance, in the words, “the public be damned.” I am sure he lived to regret it. Times and conditions have changed since then and the confidence and goodwill of the public has been found to be the most valuable asset that can be acquired. “The public be SERVED” is the new keynote, if great success is to be achieved in great undertakings, and will be more and more observed in the future. I am frank to say that in undertaking this journalistic project I hope in my heart, sincerely, to bury that unfortunate chance remark of my ancestor, under a new family slogan, that of public SERVICE. Just what first step I could take as an evidence of this purpose and its sincerity, has been the greatest problem I have had to solve. In the center pages of this miniature prospectus of the forthcoming Illustrated Daily News, I am presenting for your consideration, the answer to this problem.A PUBLIC THE publication of a great daily newspaper, is in my judgment, a matter of a public trust. Unfortunately few, if any, newspapers are in any way accountable to the public and yet they hold and exercise an appalling power over the interests and welfare of the community and over the reputations and very lives of the men and women composing it. Trial by newspaper, constituting itself judge, jury and special advocate, has almost superseded trial by our courts. In the matter of news or the vital issues of the day—local and national, almost whatever slant and bias those controlling the newspapers desire to give, can be given and whatever hidden interests desired, may be served. As a first pledge of good faith and as a new departure in journalism, I propose to deposit in trust, 51% of the capital stock of my publishing corporation owning the News, and to assign the declared earnings of this 51% to certain beneficiaries whose names are to be registered with the trustee bank. Along with the assignment of this 51% of net earnings, I propose to also assign to the beneficiaries so named and registered, the right of election of two managing directors, two others to be selected by me, and the fifth to be selected by these four. I do not desire any investment, having no investments to offer. This 51% of the capital stock—a majority interest, will be my personal gift to the trusteeship, as a hostage of sincerity and good faith in the administration of this newspaper for the public service and no other. The trust indenture being drawn will embody this trust and its terms will be common knowledge. As the result of most careful investigation, carefully laid plans, matured organization, ample equipment and my own financial responsibility and experience, I am convincedTRUST that such a daily newspaper as I propose to publish here in Greater Los Angeles, and, with its success here also establish in other cities along similar lines, will prove not only a great power and influence in the public service but a most welcome guest in hundreds of thousands of homes and should prove a very profitable enterprise. The comparative cost of production, including a superior photographic service, etc., are all in its favor. I am frank to state what must be apparent to any intelligent person, that such a home circulation as this plan will be instrumental in at once establishing, will in itself be one of the most valuable advertising franchises possible to obtain, one that would probably cost me a fortune and many years to establish in any other manner. Under the existing downtown monopoly of newspaper sales here—different from that established in other great cities,—to break into a downtown street sale, would mean not alone a bitter battle, but a costly one. The subsidies paid the downtown street-corner newsboy organizations are estimated to be in excess of $350,000 per annum. My proposition therefore has sound business sense behind it. With the News established almost overnight in thousands of homes and with its first subscribers personally and directly interested in its success and electing members of its board of management, a downtown street circulation would be a matter of secondary consideration and then much more readily established. I trust that sound business sense will always govern each step of this undertaking and that coupled with it shall be a sincerity of purpose that will establish a public confidence, the greatest possible asset and franchise of any newspaper.Special Harbor Service GREATER Los Angeles is slowly turning around to face the sea. Its great harbor is one of the most vital and important factors in the destiny of this city. Ninety-five steamship lines now make it a port of regular call and yet it has no special newspaper staff to meet the incoming ships and give to the people of this community regular daily information of the stupendous development of its commerce, the arrival of important people, etc. The News will have its own harbor press-boat, meeting every incoming and departing vessel and daily reporting by photograph and dispatch all matters of maritime interest, keeping the people of this community in daily touch with their harbor and bringing home to them its vital necessity and requirements. Features The Illustrated Daily News, in addition to its pictorial pages giving the news events by actual photographs, will contain: The United News dispatches, covering the world’s daily news. Leased-wire coast news dispatches, specially covering Pacific Coast. The London Times world-wide news service. Financial and market reports of London, New York and Middle West markets. The world’s Automobile and Aeroplane news. Sporting news and features. Children’s and household sections. The C-V cartoon and comic services and features. Contests, innumerable, with liberal awards.How the beneficiaries of my offer are to be selected THE price of the Illustrated Daily News will be ONE CENT per copy except for the special feature issues produced by rotogravure copper-etching and other fine printing processes which special issues will be 10 cents per copy. The advance subscription price for ALL issues, for a year, is $5. Instead of first attempting to force a street sale of this newspaper in the downtown sections (an enormously costly and a very difficult matter in the face of a practical monopoly and subsidizing of the downtown corners) I am sending this announcement simultaneously to a great many people in every section of Greater Los Angeles, in an effort to secure a very large number of home subscribers as a foundation for this new and up-to-date metropolitan daily. Those receiving my letter and this prospectus who at once send in their advance subscriptions for the first year, will be those who I propose to make the beneficiaries of the trust of 51% of the capital stock of my corporation as stated under the heading “A Public Trust,” on another page of this prospectus. A reasonable time will be allowed to elapse after the mailing of this prospectus and letter, when the offer and lists will be presumed to be closed, and those who have responded will become my associates without investment on their part under the terms of the trust indenture, entitled to receive the net declared earnings of 51% of the capital stock of my publishing corporation and to select two out of .five members of the managing board, but without any liability on their part. I hope to make the Illustrated Daily News a great newspaper in the service of the people of this community, as well as a valuable and profitable enterprise. The financial and business responsibilities rest on my shoulders but the responsibility for the policies of the NEWS will be largely in the hands of the registered beneficial associates numbering those who respond to my proposition.People of Prominence at Home and AbroadOrganization The following arrangements have been consummated: (1) The mechanical equipment is ready to be shipped into the city and can be installed for production of the News within a short time. (2) A temporary building has been secured until a fine downtown office building with club rooms for subscribers, business men’s club rooms, rest rooms and other modern facilities for a great metropolitan newspaper, can be built. (3) A large local photographic staff, together with national and international photographic services, is immediately available. (4) A carefully chosen editorial and mechanical staff has been provided for. Preference in all possible positions throughout the organization, particularly in the circulation department, will be given to ex-service men of the late war. (5) The management and editorial policy of the News will be controlled by the Board of Managers, two of the five members being elected by the beneficiary subscribers, and representing them. I will be the first president of the corporation, owning and publishing the News, and its other officers will be chosen by the Board of Managers. A well known firm of certified Public Accountants will be in charge of the auditing and accounting.My Offer to You IN establishing this trust and the election of a first managerial board, the first requisite is the registration of the names of those who will be the beneficiaries under it so that a vote may be had and the trusteeship established. My letter and this miniature prospectus is being mailed to a large number of people in Greater Los Angeles and nearby cities, whose names have been taken at random from every profession, trade, business industry and walk in life, with a considerable percentage of women, since the News will be primarily a home newspaper. Those first responding will be the beneficiaries of the trusteeship of 51% of the net earnings of my publishing company and will elect two members of the first board of managers. As the recipient of my letter and this prospectus you are one of those who are invited to register yourself as one of the beneficiaries with the right to vote, by sending in your one year subscription in advance. On the opposite page you will find the subscription blank and the ballot and on its reverse side, a place for any suggestions you may care to make to me, which will be greatly appreciated. You are invited to fill in the names of two people who in your opinion should be on this first board of management. The result of this ballot will be considered as an election of the two persons in the community who receive the highest vote and they will be asked to accept a place on the board of managing directors. I will appoint two others, and these four will then elect the fifth member. Election of• their successor will take place at stated intervals, as provided in the trusteeship. Since it is not possible to mail a second invitation and as the number of those who will be embraced under the trusteeship as beneficiaries will be limited, an immediate response is necessary or I will consider that you do not desire to take advantage of my offer and some one else will therefore be substituted in your place. If not convenient to remit the subscription price, you can sign the note for it, which will be accepted. Once the list of the beneficiaries who will be my associates in this undertaking, has been made up, it will be closed and their names registered with the trustee bank under the trust. They alone will have a vote in the election of managing directors and be entitled to the distribution of 51% of the net earnings of the News annually, as provided in the trust indenture.Detach this page, sign and forward by return mail. Subscription and Ballot ..................-............, June״...1923 ,. CORNELIUS VANDERBILT, JR., Union Bank Building־, Eighth & Hill Sts., Los Angeles, Calif. Enclosed find my remittance note for $5, payment in advance for one year’s subscription to the Illustrated Daily News, to be delivered to my address given below. Under the terms of your offer, I am to be registered with the trustee as one of the beneficiaries of the trust of 51% of the net declared earnings of your publishing company, owning and publishing the News, and to the right of voting in the election of two of the managing directors, under the terms of the trust indenture governing this trust. If this subscription is rejected by you, my remittance is to be returned, and you reserve the right of rejection or acceptance for any reason satisfactory to you. I understand that I am not making any investment whatever and that the beneficiary interest in net earnings is a gift from you, not transferable, or assignable and is subject to the terms of the trusteeship when established. Signature................................................ P. 0. Address.______________________City................. BALLOT If my above subscription is accepted, I cast my vote for the following named as two of the first board of managers. .................................of............................. ..............................of................................ If not convenient to remit the $5.00, sign the note below. $5.00 NOTE .........-...........—-..........., June....., 1923. For value received I promise to pay to Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jr., or order, thirty days from date hereof, the sum of FIVE DOLLARS at the Union Bank & Trust Company, Los Angeles. Signature..................................................... P. O. Address..........................City...................SUGGESTIONS FOR THE Illustrated Daily News NOTE: You are invited to make any suggestions in connection with the Illustrated Daily News when sending in your subscription and ballot and they will be deeply appreciated. CORNELIUS VANDERBILT, JR., Illustrated Daily News, Los Angeles, California. I have the following suggestions to make in connection with the publishing of the Illustrated Daily News: Signature.................................................. Address....................................................