E. W. Scripps was born and raised in Rushville, Illinois, to James Mogg Scripps from London, and Julia Adeline Osborne from New York. E. W. was the youngest of five children born to James and Julia. James had seven children from previous marriages. E. W., as with many businessmen of his day, went by his initials rather than writing out his first and middle name. He often signed his middle name as "Wyllis". E. W. was a prolific consumer of whisky and cigars, according to his confidential assistant Gilson Gardner, and was said to drink a gallon each day while bearing a lit cigar at all waking hours.
Newspaper career
Both E. W. and his half-sister Ellen worked with his older half-brother, James when he founded The Detroit News in 1873. E. W. started as an office boy at the paper. In 1878, with loans from his half-brothers, E. W. went on to found The Penny Press in Cleveland. With financial support from sister Ellen, he went on to begin or acquire some 25 newspapers. This was the beginning of a media empire that is now the E. W. Scripps Company. E. W. would lend money to promising young, local newspaper publishers, and buy the most successful one, having 51% share of the paper. Once bought, he did not "sell out," but held on to the paper. A guiding tenet of E. W. was that local editors know best about running local newspapers. Editors were carefully groomed and given considerable autonomy. Among the innovations E. W. made were distributing newspapers to the suburbs and, with his brother James, of getting the bulk of income from advertisers instead of subscribers. In 1907, Scripps created United Press Associations, now United Press International, from smaller regional news services. Scripps later said "I regard my life's greatest service to the people of this country to be the creation of the United Press", to provide competition to the Associated Press. Scripps believed in editorial independence, stating,
Later life
In 1898, he finished building a home in San Diego, where his half-sister lived nearby, thinking that the dry, warm climate would help his allergic rhinitis that he had all his life. He built it as a winter home to escape the cold of West Chester,, Ohio but eventually lived there year-round, and conducted his newspaper business from the ranch. His ranch encompassed what is today the community of Scripps Ranch as well as Marine Corps Air Station Miramar. In 1903, he and his half-sister Ellen were the founding donors of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Initially Scripps was reluctant to support the venture, thinking scientists could not be businesslike. However, he developed a deep friendship with the scientific director, William Emerson Ritter, and together they began to plan projects for the Institute. As the Institute started to succeed, he became an enthusiastic supporter, and took a great interest in its work. William Randolph Hearst and Scripps were often at loggerheads as to who owned the better newspaper conglomerate. In 1921, Scripps founded Science Service, now named the Society for Science & the Public, with the goal of keeping the public informed of scientific achievements. The organization continues to run as a non-profit dedicated to the promotion of science. Scripps College is also named in his step sister, Ellen Browning Scripps', honor, because a large part of its endowment derives from the media fortune they had built . Scripps died at the age of 71 on March 12, 1926. As requested, his body was buried at sea by being dumped overboard from his yacht. Among his descendants was Samuel H. Scripps, grandson, who became a leading philanthropist for theater and dance in America in the late 20th century.
