Starship Asterisk*

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116240/quotes wrote:
___ Memorable quotes for _The Evening Star_ (1996)

Garrett Breedlove (Jack Nicholson): There she is, the evening star.
She shines first, she shines brightest, and she shines longest.

Aurora Greenway (Shirley MacLaine): I'm surrounded by the most taxing array of lunatics

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Star wrote:
<<The Washington Star was founded on December 16, 1852 by Captain Joseph Borrows Tate. Originally headquartered in Washington's "Newspaper Row" on Pennsylvania Avenue, Tate initially gave the paper the name The Daily Evening Star, and it would be renamed several times before becoming Washington Star by the late 1970s.

In 1853, Texas surveyor and newspaper entrepreneur William Douglas Wallach purchased the paper. As the sole owner of the paper for the next 14 years, Wallach built up the paper by capitalizing on reporting of the American Civil War, among other things.

On May 1, 1938, the Star purchased the M. A. Leese Radio Corporation and acquired Washington's oldest radio station, WMAL, in the process. Renamed the Evening Star Broadcasting Company, the 1938 acquisition would figure later in the 1981 demise of the newspaper.

The Star's influence and circulation peaked in the 1950s; it constructed a new printing plant in Southeast Washington capable of printing millions of copies, but found itself unable to cope with changing times. Nearly all top editorial and business staff jobs were held by members of the owning families, including a Kauffmann general manager who had gained a reputation for anti-Semitism, driving away advertisers. Suburbanization and television were accelerating the decline of evening newspapers in favor of morning dailies. The Post meanwhile acquired its morning rival, the Times-Herald, in 1954 and steadily drew readers and advertisers away from the falling Star. By the 1960s, the Post was Washington's leading newspaper.

In 1972, the Star purchased and absorbed one of DC's few remaining competing newspapers, The Washington Daily News. For a short period of time after the merger, both "The Evening Star" and "The Washington Daily News" mastheads appeared on the front page. The paper soon was retitled "Washington Star News" and finally, "The Washington Star" by the late 1970s.

In 1973, the Star was targeted for clandestine purchase by interests close to the South African Apartheid government in its propaganda war, in what became known as the Muldergate Scandal. The Star, whose editorial policy had always been conservative, was seen as favorable to South Africa at the time.

On February 2, 1978, Time Inc. purchased the Star for $20 million. Their flagship magazine, Time, was archrival to Newsweek, which was published by the Washington Post Company, and the purchase seemed natural.

On August 7, 1981, after 130 years, the Washington Star ceased publication. In the bankruptcy sale, the Post purchased the land and buildings owned by the Star, including its printing presses. Many of the people who worked for the Star went to work for the newly formed Washington Times which began operations shortly after the Star went out of business.>>

neufer wrote:In 1972, the Star purchased and absorbed one of DC's few remaining competing newspapers, The Washington Daily News.

owlice wrote:

neufer wrote:In 1972, the Star purchased and absorbed one of DC's few remaining competing newspapers, The Washington Daily News.

There went my little paper route. The News was a tabloid rather than broadsheet, making it an odd-paper-out in the DC news wars.

In the stack o' newspapers is the last Star and also a copy of the Post that day, which carried news of the demise of the Star above the fold on its front page. I'm sure we took the Star because the Post was too liberal for my mother. She was an equal-opportunity publicity hound, however, and called both papers when my younger brother got his first haircut; he was front-page news for both papers.

beyond wrote:You could call it - My Mothers House.

neufer wrote:One felt like a mouse in a maze wending through her apartment.

neufer wrote:I got real excited once when I discovered a personally autographed copy of Martin Luther King's last book...but, alas, it appears to be a forged autograph (probably by Coretta Scott who was once a pupil of my aunt Ruth).

owlice wrote:

neufer wrote:I got real excited once when I discovered a personally autographed copy of Martin Luther King's last book...but, alas, it appears to be a forged autograph (probably by Coretta Scott who was once a pupil of my aunt Ruth).

What did your Aunt Ruth teach Coretta Scott?