Josephus daniels house

When Josephus Daniels purchased the Raleigh News and Observer in 1894, he immediately became one of the leading political figures in the state. The paper, which by 1898 was the self-proclaimed "largest daily in North Carolina," was strongly Democratic and became the closest thing to an official party organ.

Daniels was involved in the Democrats' 1898 campaign from the beginning, working with Furnifold Simmons and other party leaders to formulate strategy. Daniels wrote later that "The News and Observer was the printed voice of the campaign." In the months leading up to the November election, the News and Observer hammered away at Republican and Populist leaders and maintained the party's steady cry of white supremacy. Daniels wrote,

. . . The News and Observer was relied upon to carry the Democratic message and to be the militant voice of White Supremacy, and it did not fail in what was expected, sometimes going to extremes in its partisanship. Its correspondents visited every town where the Fusionists were in control and presented column after

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Josephus Daniels

Josephus Daniels was a close friend and political ally of President Franklin Roosevelt. He served as secretary of the U.S. Navy during World War I under President Woodrow Wilson, and was later appointed the U.S. Ambassador to Mexico by FDR.

Early Life

Josephus Daniels was born on May 18, 1862, in Washington, North Carolina. He attended Wilson Collegiate Institute and at Trinity College (now Duke University). While he earned his law degree from the University of North Carolina, he never practiced.

A career newspaperman, Daniels got his start editing the Wilson Advance, which he ultimately purchased. A few years later, he became a co-owner of the Kinston Free Press and the Rocky Mount Reporter. In 1885, Daniels acquired the State Chronicle and the Farmer and Mechanic. He merged the two Raleigh-based publications to eventually create a daily newspaper.

Daniels used his newspapers to espouse his political views and became influential in the Democratic Party. In 1887, he was elected to the office of Printer-to-the-State. He was subsequently reelected in

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512 pp., 6.125 x 9.25, 26 halftones, notes, bibl., index

• Paperback ISBN: 978-1-4696-5323-5
  Published: February 2019
• E-book EPUB ISBN: 978-1-4696-0696-5
  Published: May 2013
• E-book PDF ISBN: 979-8-8908-4034-9
  Published: May 2013

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Author Q&A

As a longtime leader of the Democratic Party and key member of Woodrow Wilson's cabinet, Josephus Daniels was one of the most influential progressive politicians in the country, and as secretary of the navy during the First World War, he became one of the most important men in the world. Before that, Daniels revolutionized the newspaper industry in the South, forever changing the relationship between politics and the news media. Lee A. Craig, an expert on economic history, delves into Daniels's extensive archive to inform this nuanced and eminently readable biography, following Daniels's rise to power in North Carolina and chronicling his influence on twentieth-century politics.

A man of great contradictions, Daniels--