"WASPs" vs. Jews, pt. 7

A commenter at Steve Sailer's linked to this 2007 Jewish Journal article, which mixes ethnic triumphalism with whines about the "anti-Semitism" (and table manners) of the old Los Angeles elite.

Happily for them, most of the old-time Los Angeles anti-Semites who used to hang out at the downtown California Club are either dead or too old to care that a Jew is on the verge of owning the L.A. Times.

Not just any Jew. Sam Zell looks as though he's one tough Jew, probably even tougher than the old California Clubbers who stole the water from the Owens Valley and got rich in sneaky San Fernando Valley land deals. [. . .]

However it turns out, we'll probably have a Jew in charge of the Times, which was once one of old Los Angeles' most famous WASP institutions. What a great day for old L.A. Jews with long memories of country clubs and downtown clubs that banned them; restrictive covenants that kept them out of certain fancy neighborhoods; anti-Semitic fraternities and sororities at USC and UCLA and law firms that never seemed able to find a place for a smart Jewish attorney. They also may have memories of the old Times, which, while not anti-Semitic, was a perfect reflection of the conservative Republican WASP culture of Los Angeles' upper classes. [. . .]

This was not the story told by most of those at the top levels of the Times when I got there in 1970. I was invited to luncheons for dignitaries in the most exclusive executive dining room. Everyone ate slowly and talked quietly. Silences were broken by the clink of expensive silverware. Nobody asked the dignitaries rude questions. I learned to eat slowly and not talk with my hands.

But the old Times was disappearing. Jews moved into top positions. As the years went on, one of our publishers was Dave Laventhol. We had a Jewish managing editor, a Jewish national editor and many other Jewish editors and reporters.

More than that, the grand lady of the Times, Dorothy Chandler, who was a daughter of a Long Beach merchant family and not part of the L.A. establishment, had made friends with Westside Jews. She was building the Music Center and figured that the culture-loving Jewish community would help finance the place. She helped Jews join the L.A. mainstream.

Even with the changes, there was something sedate, non-Jewish, about the Times. It was too dignified for a newspaper, too conscious of its long history. From the busts of the Chandlers in the Globe Lobby to the reception and dining rooms on the sixth floor, gravitas was deeply embedded in a building put up in 1934 during the era of rich WASP L.A. supremacy.