Extract from oral history of Tom Fitzgerald by Ken Inglis

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John Curtin Prime Ministerial Library. Records of the National Library of Australia. Interview of Tom Fitzgerald, 01/02/1998 - 3/09/1998. JCPML00658/1. Original held by National Library of Australia TRC 2247

When he [Rupert Murdoch] first approached me, possibly before that... he approached me umpteen times over a period of... it was ten years before I agreed, for a range of reasons, to have a try with him... to try myself with him, he was quite adamant that I couldn’t be both his editorial panjandrum, whatever it was, and have Nation.

And when I jibbed immediately at that... it’s hard for people to realise, Ken, that to a journalist who was in the kitchen of a daily newspaper, having the freedom to produce your own paper, however small, is infinitely more rewarding than to be the nominal editor of any bloody metropolitan paper. People at the Herald couldn’t understand this any more than Murdoch. It’s... it couldn’t be more... and I’m sure most journalists would... would automatically say so. Angus Maude, when Editor of the Herald, used to speak enviously to me about my having Nation. He had miseries. The editors of the Herald in my time all had their miseries. In my time. There was a great interlude when James Fairfax, after I left, made things different.

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