JOSEPH MEDILL was one of the most powerful newspapermen of his time. He was born in Canada in 1823, but he moved to Ohio as a child. His first newspaper was a small-town outfit, the Coshocton Republican. He then expanded his reach into Cleveland, and in 1854, he took over the then-fledgling Chicago Tribune. Medill was one of the first members of the Republican Party, but he only ran for office once. Immediately after the Chicago Fire, he was elected mayor of Chicago. Medill served for two years but found it exhausting. He ended up resigning before his term was complete, after which he went back to journalism. Medill died in 1899. Two of his grandsons, Robert McCormick and Joseph Medill Patterson, became crusading publishers in their own right. They also founded Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, and they kept the Tribune in the family for generations.