Man Against the Tide

FOR OFFICIAL CONSIDERATION

CALIFORNIA NEWSPAPER HALL OF FAME

CALIFORNIA PRESS ASSOCIATION

TIME MAGAZINE: Mr. Hoiles is slightly to the right of Herod.

ASSOCIATED PRESS: He was one of the giants in American journalism and our profession is the poorer now that he is gone.

NATION'S SCHOOLS MAGAZINE: Hoiles pours poison into the public consciousness.

UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL: He was a towering figure in American journalism.

MILWAUKEE JOURNAL: Among the bigoted, stingy and lunatic elements. His editors and printers grind their teeth to the roots as they handle his copy.

NEW YORK TIMES: Mr. Hoiles was a publisher of a hinterland journalistic empire. There may be individuals with equally unconventional views around the country but none has the combination of status, wealth and possible public influence.

TIME MAGAZINE: Hoiles has a Stone Age philosophy with one touch of liberalism in his record: during the war, he campaigned to give the Japanese-Americans a break.

COPLEY VEWS SERVICE: He was a truly great man and a member of that small group of vanishing Americans from which we have all gained much strength and heritage.

TIME MAGAZINE: A terrible tempered prune face.

NEW YORK TIMES: His papers are bright and he insists on keeping news presentation objective.

CALIFORNIA NEWSPAPER PUBLISHERS ASSN.: Raymond Cyrus Hoiles does not believe in taxes, compulsory public support of schools, the postal system, fire department or police force. He's been described as crusty, prejudiced, bitter, and as one Texas public official said, "He's against everything."

THE FREE TRADER MAGAZINE (Great Britain): A great guardian of liberty.

THE CALIFORNIA PUBLISHER: He's been branded a Jew, an anti-Semite, a Catholic, and anti-Christ, a Communist, and a Fascist.

EVANGELIST BILLY GRAHAM: Mr. Hoiles encourages spirituality in his newspapers. He gave me the best cooperation in my entire career.

RADIO STATION KNX: Freedom Newspapers, Inc., headed by Mr. Hoiles, are a powerful force in molding people.

DR. F. A. HARPER, Economist and Author: A man marked with true greatness and goodness who devoted his life to truth which was his only guide.

ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS: A man who devoted his life to the cause of maintaining individual liberty in a world where he saw that liberty often threatened. He fought unswervingly for that in which he believed, remaining always true to himself. A distinguished newspaper career.

CALIFORNIA NEWSPAPER PUBLISHERS ASSN.: R. C., as he is known to his associates, is not a man to compromise with principle. Hoiles thinks of himself as a newspaper publisher first and a political philosopher second. The Hoiles' philosophy stems from his deep-seated belief in a universal single standard of right.

WALTER KNOTT, Knotts Berry Farm: Mr. Hoiles wielded a great influence.

CHAIRMAN, ORANGE COUNTY DEMOCRATIC COUNCIL: Of course, I didn't agree with his politics but he was a man of great integrity and he ran fair newspapers.

JAPANESE-AMERICAN CITIZENS LEAGUE: Mr. Hoiles was the only one with the courage of his convictions in taking a strong editorial stand against evacuation and relocation of more than 110,000 Japanese-Americans on the West Coast during World War II. In his editorials in The Register and other Freedom Newspapers, Mr. Hoiles challenged the government's right forcibly to relocate American citizens.

NEW YORK TIMES: The impact of his efforts is hard to measure. However, his Santa Ana paper undoubtedly has been a factor in the intense conservative spirit to be found in Orange County which adjoins Los Angeles. His constant battering at labor unionism has been a major source of open shop sentiment.

A REGISTER READER: I associate Mr. Hoiles with a strict definition of freedom and liberty. I have learned to respect him for encouraging others to think for themselves. He was an honorable and dedicated American newsman. His contribution and his unflinching dedication to liberty and humanity is immeasurable. With men like Mr. Hoiles, the torch of liberty will not be extinguished.

MAYOR OF SANTA ANA: R. C. Hoiles has promoted the Libertarian movement for 50 years but it is only now beginning to make itself felt in intellectual circles. It has grown to significant proportions. Mr. Hoiles was not a disciple of any doctrine or philosopher. He owed no allegiance to any political party or political school of thought. He honestly allowed margin for error in his own thinking and welcomed criticism or constructive evaluation.

OMICRON DELTA ALPHA FRATERNITY: Outstanding in the defense of freedom and opposing Communism.

ROBERT LEFEVRE, President of Rampart College: The most remarkable thing about him was his willingness to stick his neck out. He was a one-man institution. When he was 84 he attended my classes in Colorado as the oldest person who had ever studied with me. R. C. demonstrated his ability to grapple with new ideas.

DR. F. A. HARPER, Economist and Author: He was a man who wasn't afraid to espouse unpopular causes and who would stick rigidly by what he thought was right. A source of continuing controversy over his editorial stand against "government schools," Mr. Hoiles maintained that tax-supported schools are based on forced taxation, and force, he said, was immoral whether it originated with an armed robber or a government. As his newspaper empire grew, so did his reputation as a crusading editor continually searching for truth. In his latter years, Mr. Hoiles' name began appearing in college journalism textbooks, usually in the context of a representative of a vanishing breed of newsmen willing to fight for a cause. At the time of his death, newspapers carrying the familiar "Torch of Freedom" on their mastheads were going into more than a half-million homes in California, Texas, Ohio, Colorado, New Mexico, North Carolina and Florida.

DEAN WITTER & COMPANY: He kept himself informed on community affairs and he had the interest of the community at heart. Sometimes we didn't agree with Ray but we always had a friendly exchange of ideas and he was very broadminded.

EDITORIAL ON THE DEATH OF MR. HOILES: Much controversy has surrounded his career. When, in Ohio, a bomb blew off the porch of his home and another placed in his car, the reason was his paper's expose of government corruption. But most of the controversy that surrounded him was because of his stand that government should not be in the school business. He also opposed any other intervention in the lives of individuals. In recent years, an increasing number of people are saying, "Mr. Hoiles has the right idea."

ROSE WILDER LANE: Mr. Hoiles, innumerable other persons are and will be indebted to you, more than you or they will ever know, for your candle not only sheds its beams far in darkness, but kindles others that kindle more lights. It's good that you were born.

WESTBROOK PEGLER: I think you are one of the few editors, as distinguished from editorial clerks, propagandists and merchants of palatable information and opinion, in the United States.

FRANK CHODOROV: I wish there were many more like you around. The world would be a far more interesting place to live in. In the darkness of collectivism which now envelops the earth, those who preach the doctrines of freedom are indeed like beacon lights.

COLUMNIST JOHN W. BECK: In our present maelstrom of conflicting ideologies, and of political and business expediencies so often used at the expense of integrity, it is heartening to think of you, and to know you will not swerve from your high principles, that you have the courage of your convictions, and that consistency -- that rare jewel of jewels -- shines throughout all your efforts. This can be said of but very few men.

LUDWIG MISES, New York University: Over a period of more than 50 years you have brilliantly served your fellow-citizens as a champion of freedom and a staunch advocate of sound economic policies. You never made compromises and your example is remarkable indeed in this time-serving and compromising age.

ERNEST BENN, Society of Individualists, London: I envy you your success and the size of the organization you have created to keep alive the ideals on which civilization depends and without which it must come to an end.

CONGRESSMAN RALPH W. GWINN, Washington, D.C.: I am proud to be a fellow citizen of one who holds that the government is bound by the same rules of moral conduct that the individual is bound by. Having a newspaper merely extends and enlarges the individual's moral obligations. So I salute you, sir, as one who has refused to dissolve his individual moral sense in his newspapers.

COLUMNIST GEORGE PECK: As you are aware, our columns are released under the caption, "The American Way," and as you further know, I am acquainted with thousands of editors across the nation. Let me say to you in all sincerity, I know of no editor or publisher who more closely typifies "'The American Way," or who has done more to preserve it than R. C. Hoiles.

MERWIN K. HART, President, National Economic Council: You have been and are a tower of strength to the libertarians of the United States. It is men such as you who throughout history have been the real defenders and champions of American liberty.

GEORGE S. BENSON, President, Harding College: Your newspaper fight for America's Constitutional Government and freedom of individual opportunity is extremely commendable because principles and ideals do not continue from generation to generation just because they are right, they do not continue from generation to generation just because they are legislated. On the contrary, they must be taught to generation after generation or they will cease to exist. I have genuine admiration for your courage and your determination and the great service that you have rendered to your fellow man.

WILLIS E. STONE, President, American Progress Foundation: In the larger sense, your greatest success as a patriot comes from the faith, courage, resolution and objectivity you have instilled in the hearts of others.

VERNE P. KAUB, President, American Council of Christian Laymen: Your Freedom Newspapers are outstanding in the field of daily journalism. You lend to these papers an editorial touch which is unsurpassed. You have every reason to be proud of the contributions which you have made to the cause of liberty.

NEWS STORY ON DEATH OF MR. HOILES: His life was an editorial. In death he leaves a legacy of millions of words suggesting to all who will listen that human beings can enjoy happier, more prosperous lives in a voluntary society in which no man uses force or threat of force against his neighbor. Fie operated successfully in the field of mass communication for more than 65 years, often in direct competition with publishers who took a less rigid stand against socialism. At the time of his death, The Register, flagship of the 20-newspaper group, was the largest selling daily newspaper in Orange County', the nation's most competitive newspaper market.

MOVIE, ''MAN AGAINST THE TIDE," about Mr. Hoiles' life: "I have tried to get people to think. They have to know when their freedom is being taken away from them. And they have to think to make decisions. All life is making decisions .... " -- R. C. Hoiles

NEW YORK TIMES: He was generous in fostering schools, lectures and publications aligned with his philosophy and an enthusiastic circulator of books, pamphlets and magazines that tend to support his opinions and is a tireless personal preacher and discussant of his views.

THE CALIFORNIA PUBLISHER: An expose by Hoiles of an alleged paving contract corruption by his competitor in Ohio caused one of the bitterest newspaper battles in Ohio history. It lasted for over three years and saw such gangland techniques used against Hoiles as house bombings and sticks of dynamite under the hood of a car.

NEW YORK TIMES: Gives the appearance of mild, almost shy man, amiable in his contempt of many present-day shibboleths; eager to reason about his views and even, on occasion, to alter them. Hoiles says he is against anything that restricts free trade, internationally or domestically, including the licensing of businesses, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, labor unionization which he says deprives members of the right to work without paying tribute and religious organizations which advocate compulsion to enforce social norms.

RAYMOND CYRUS HOILES

BORN:

November 24, 1878, rambling farm house in Alliance, Ohio.

FATHER:

Samuel Harrison Hoiles, a prosperous farmer.

MOTHER:

Ann Ladd Hoiles, an extensive reader.

EDUCATION:

Mt. Union College, Alpha Tau Omega fraternity.

Myrtle Crumb Hoiles, Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, secretary (Feb., 1905)

CHILDREN:

Clarence Harrison Hoiles, Raymond Crumb Hoiles, Harry Howard Hoiles and Mary Jane Hoiles.

EMPLOYMENT RECORD:

Newspaper subscription salesman, printer's devil, newspaper bookkeeper, part-owner of newspaper with his brother, part-owner of another newspaper with brother, broke partnership with his brother and became independent publisher of two newspapers, began buying papers that led to what New York Times said was a "hinderland journalistic empire'' of 20 newspapers.

Continued to come to work until the week of his death at 91.