Conrad Black

Conrad Moffat Black, Lord Black of Crossharbour (born August 25, 1944) is a Canadian-born British financier and newspaper magnate.

Through his Ravelston Corporation he has a 82% share-holding in the Toronto-based Hollinger Inc group which, through Hollinger International Inc., owns or controls several newspapers, notably in the United States, United Kingdom, and Israel, including The Daily Telegraph (1985), The Chicago Sun-Times (1994) and The Jerusalem Post (1988). He also controls the right-wing magazine The Spectator (1988) and holds a minority interest in The New York Sun (2002). Hollinger once owned a large number of Canadian newspapers, accounting for a plurality of that country's daily newspaper circulation, and acquired and relaunched the Financial Post as the National Post (1998), in large part to get a foothold in the competitive Toronto newspaper market.

Black was born into a wealthy Toronto family, his father George Montegu Black, Jr., was the president of Canadian Breweries, an international brewing conglomerate. Conrad Black was first educated at Upper Canada College from which he was expelled, he continued his education at Carleton University (History, 1965) and Laval University (Law, 1970), later completing a MA at McGill University. He became involved in a number of businesses mainly newspapers but including mining and publishing. His family founded the Ravelston Corporation in 1969 as an investment vehicle. For a time, Black worked for a small Sherbrooke, Quebec newspaper with a friend, David Radler. After a few years, they bought the "Sherbrooke Record" and in 1971 formed "Sterling Newspapers Limited," a holding company that would acquire several other small newspapers.

Conrad Black was taken under the wing of Bud McDougald and E.P. Taylor, two of the most powerful businessmen in Canada. Following the death of McDougald, in 1978 Conrad Black acquirted the shares owned by McDougald's widow in Argus Corporation, a mammoth Canadian holding company, which at the time Black took it over, Argus Corporation's major holdings included some of Canada's finest blue-chip companies such as Dominion Stores, Canada's largest supermarket chain, Massey Ferguson, Canada's large multi-national farm machinery corporation, Hollinger Mines, an important gold-mining company in Timmins, Ontario, and Norcen Energy, an energy and pipeline operation. His record in managing these operations is deemed by most financial experts as less than successful.

In 1985, he first entered the UK newspaper business, buying into the Telegraph group. By 1990 his companies ran over 400 newspaper titles in North America, many of these were disposed of towards the end of the 1990s with around 150 titles being sold in a single deal with CanWest Global Communications Corp. He launched the National Post in 1998 but sold his interest in 2001. He gave up the majority of his remaining Canadian media interests in 2001.

Conrad Black gave up his Canadian citizenship to become a British life peer because of Canada's Nickle Resolution that prevents Canadians from receiving foreign honours. He had attempted to hold dual nationality, suing the Canadian government in 2001.

On November 17, 2003 it was announced that he would be resigning as chief executive of Hollinger after an internal inquiry determined that he had received over $7 million in unauthorized payments of company funds. The United States SEC has launched an investigation of his company's affairs.

In November 2003 his scholarly work on Franklin Roosevelt was published and was met with positive reviews.

Black is just the latest in a series of Canadian-born British press lords. His predecessors were:

• Max Aitken (Lord Beaverbrook)
• Roy Thomson (Lord Thomson of Fleet)