In All His Glory

The Life of William S. Paley
The Legendary Tycoon and His Brilliant Circle

He is to American broadcasting as Carnegie was to steel, Ford to automobiles, Luce to publishing, and Ruth to baseball,” wrote The New York Times of William S. Paley–the man who built CBS, the “Tiffany Network.” Sally Bedell Smith’s In All His Glory takes a hard look at Paley and the perfect world he created for himself, revealing the extraordinary complexity of the man who let nothing get in the way of his vast ambitions. Tracing his life from Chicago, where Paley was born to a family of cigar makers, to the glamorous haunts of Manhattan, Smith shows us the shrewd, demanding egoist, the hedonist pursuing every form of pleasure, the corporate strongman famous for his energy and ruthlessness.

Drawing on highly placed CBS sources and hundreds of interviews, and with a supporting cast of such glittering figures as Truman Capote, Slim Keith, Jock Whitney, Ted Turner, David Sarnoff, Brooke Astor and a parade of Paley’s humiliated heirs, In All His Glory is a richly textured story of business, power, and social ambition.

“A remarkably complete, detailed and balanced study.”
Business Week

“An impressive, meticulously researched work of broadcast history as well as a piquant glimpse inside CBS’s corporate culture. Especially poignant is Smith’s description of the complex relationship between Paley and Frank Stanton, the longtime president and `conscience’ of CBS, who was crushed when Paley cast him aside rather than accept him as successor.”
Time