It was created by Eleanor "Cissy" Patterson of the Medill–McCormick–Patterson family (long-time owners of the Chicago Tribune and the New York Daily News and founding later Newsday on New York's Long Island) when she bought The Washington Times and The Washington Herald from the syndicate newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst (1863–1951), and merged them.

It had been established in 1894 and owned successively by Congressman Charles G. Conn (1844–1931) of Elkhart, Indiana, publisher Stilson Hutchins (1838–1912, previous founder/owner of The Washington Post, 1877–1889), and most recently Frank A. Munsey (1854–1925), a financier, banker and magazine publisher known as the "Dealer in Dailies" and the "Undertaker of Journalism" for his extensive newspaper syndicate.

She was eager to buy them outright, and was able to do so in 1939 at the confluence of Hearst's near-bankruptcy caused by the increasing costs of his Hearst Castle in San Simeon, California, and the purchase attempts by the rival Washington Post family of Eugene Meyer (1879–1959) and Phillip L. Graham (1915–1963), who had bought the then bankrupt Post at auction in 1933.

Patterson, unlike her cousin, Robert R. McCormick, but like her brother Joe of the New York Daily News, initially supported Roosevelt and the New Deal.

[4][6] When he announced the sale, one of the paper's board members insisted that Miller, by then Bazy Tankersley, be given a chance to purchase it, so McCormick gave her 48 hours to match the $10 million asking price.