Bancroft heir wants Dow Jones to consider other bidders

Sarah Ellison and Dennis Berman of The Wall Street Journal write Friday that Leslie Hill, a member of the Bancroft family that controls Dow Jones & Co., is looking for another bidder beside News Corp. CEO Dennis Bancroft to buy the company.

Ellis and Berman wrote, “In recent days, she has been scouring the East Coast, trying to drum up other offers for the company her family, the Bancrofts, has controlled for 105 years.

“Ms. Hill has pressed for Dow Jones management to meet with Brian Tierney, who led an investor group to buy the Philadelphia Inquirer last year; she helped encourage a hearing for Brad Greenspan, the co-founder of MySpace.com, who is trying to buy a quarter of Dow Jones; she threw herself into the minutiae of drafting editorial principles to protect the journalistic integrity of The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires.

“A retired American Airlines pilot, Ms. Hill, 53 years old, often uses flight analogies to explain the situation facing Dow Jones. ‘If you are flying into an airport, you always have two backup airports in your flight plan,’ she has told some directors, according to someone who heard her. ‘That’s what Dow Jones needs — a backup plan.'”

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