The riveting story of the country's first media dynasty, the Medills of Chicago, whose power and influence shaped the story of American and American journalism for four generations.

Fertile soil -- The patriarch -- Joseph Medill and the making of the president (1860) -- The great Chicago fire : Mayor Medill's personal phoenix -- The worst two she-devils in all of Chicago -- The Medill sisters' upward scramble -- Cissy comes of age -- The male cousins : heirs, pawns, victims, survivors -- Cissy : debutante countess -- Dynasty in jeopardy -- The countess and her admirers -- World War I and the creation of Colonel Robert R. McCormick -- The Jazz Age collides with The Chicago tribune -- The rise of the New York Daily News : love, sex, money and murder -- The Cartier life -- The colonel of Chicagoland -- The editor wore emeralds : Mrs. Eleanor Medill Patterson's Washington Herald -- Alicia Patterson, surrogate son -- The bittersweet revenge of Alicia's Newsday -- Hubris : FDR and the McCormick-Patterson axis -- The cousins in winter -- Epilogue : after the Medill century.