Newspaper Dynasties On The Decline

The Bancroft family, which has controlled the prestigious Wall Street Journal for more than a century, is the latest newspaper dynasty to be dismantled in mere months partly under the pressures of the Internet Age.

Its agreement Tuesday to sell Dow Jones & Co. for $5 billion to media mogul Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. shows how the industry's most powerful families are facing a tough choice: Cash out or watch their fortunes deteriorate as more readers and advertisers migrate to free online news sources such as Yahoo and Google.

Before the recent sell-offs, family-owned newspaper chains were considered the bulwark against corporate ownership, which had already accounted for control of other media businesses such as television and movie studios. For some families, the news-gathering business was not just about the bottom line, it was about performing a civic duty.

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