[2] Ochs' mother Bertha came to the United States in 1848, fleeing the German Revolutions in Rhenish Bavaria, and lived in the South prior to her 1853 marriage to Julius.

She sympathized with the Confederacy during the American Civil War, but the conflicting sympathies between husband and wife did not separate their household.

[3] Following the end of the Civil War, the family moved to Knoxville, Tennessee, in the eastern, Union-affiliated part of the state.

[1] At age 11, Ochs went to work at the Knoxville Chronicle as an office assistant to the newspaper's editor, William Rule, who became a mentor.

[3] His siblings also worked at the newspaper to supplement the income of their father, a lay religious leader for Knoxville's small Jewish community.

The Chronicle was the only Republican, pro-Reconstruction, newspaper in the city, but Ochs counted Father Ryan, the Poet-Priest of the Confederacy, among his customers.

On New Year's Eve 1904, Ochs had pyrotechnists illuminate his new building at One Times Square with a fireworks show from street level.

[7][9][10] Beginning with 1896, there was issued weekly a supplement, eventually called The New York Times Book Review and Magazine.

It was classified as an independent Democratic publication, and consistently opposed William Jennings Bryan in his presidential campaigns.

By its fairness in the presentation of news, editorial moderation and ample foreign service, it secured a high place in American journalism, becoming widely read and influential throughout the United States.

[1] According to Wolfgang Disch,[note 1] In 1916, Ochs communicated one of his most famous quotes, saying, "I affirm that more than 50% of money spent on advertising is squandered and is a sheer waste of printers' ink."

He was active in the early years of the Anti-Defamation League, where he served as an executive board member, and used his influence as publisher of The New York Times to convince other newspapers nationwide to cease the unjustified caricaturing and lampooning of Jews in the American media.