Joseph Hoffman's Impact On Social Papers

He came to the United States back in 1864, seeking a military career as an enlist for the American Civil War. After the war ended, he arrived in St. Louis and became a reporter for Westliche Post, a german daily paper. Eventually he had become very active in politics, he helped put together the Liberal Republican Party, and was elected to be Missouri’s state legislature.

Pulitzer started buying newspapers. By 1871, he purchased a share of the paper Westliche Post but ended up selling it. Three years later he got ahold of another German paper- the Staats Zeitung and sold it to Globe. Later on, he merged two papers (Post, Dispatch) into the Post-Dispatch. This soon became the city’s main nightly newspaper. After St. Louis, Joseph decided to

go for New York City. Here he purchased a morning newspaper, called the World. Pulitzer turned the paper into the leading voice of the Democratic Party of the U.S.. He also founded the Evening World. The World’s coverage was increasingly flamboyant. Especially on the Sunday edition when the editorship was under Arthur Brisbane
In Pulitzers newspapers, he threw together political corruption, publicity stunts, flagrant self advertising, and yellow journalism. Along with these efforts to attract mass readers, he also introduced comics, coverage of sports, women’s fashion, and illustrations. He combined Entertainment with information.
An intense competition came between Pulitzers World and the New York Morning Journal, by William Randolph Hearst. Hearst lured Pulitzers Sunday staff to his own with a promise of a raise. All but one accepted the offer. Pulitzer got them back with a raise offer of his own, but Hearst countered it and caused some to go back to the Journal. Both Newspapers used yellow journalism in their beliefs of the Spanish American War in 1898. Pulitzer had to give up his management of newspapers due to his eyesight failing and his nervous disorder worsening. In 1890, he abandoned his editorship to his newspapers, but he still continued to keep a close watch over the policies of their editing.
In Josephs will, he endowed the school Columbia University of Journalism. He also established the reputable Pulitzer Prizes awarded yearly since 1917.