The Mast-Head: When Stories Take Off

It would be great publicity for all involved, if anyone reads it. That was part of my thinking this week on a story about a portrait of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis whose ownership is disputed in a federal lawsuit.

One of the indisputable truths about media in these times is that readership is fractured into innumerable discrete groups. Television news, which once was confined to the big national networks and their local affiliates, matters far less than it once did. Newspapers’ monopolies on the public’s attention ended with the rise of radio. On the internet, social media spoon up news your friends “like” and little else.

The Jackie O painting story was first reported by The New York Post and Daily News on Saturday. Other news outlets picked it up, and by Monday it was everywhere, or so it seemed. The story, I assumed, was interesting enough that, at least locally, it would cross over into general consciousness.

In short, the suit alleges that a small painting of the future first lady was stolen from the Beale house, otherwise known as Grey Gardens, in the 1960s or early ’70s. What is not disputed is that Terry Wallace, who runs a gallery in East Hampton Village, bought the painting from an unnamed antiques dealer in about 1988.

A Beale nephew, who lives in California and who has not been shy about trying to cash in on the family name with a line of fashion accessories, wants the painting for himself and has sued in federal court seeking its handover.

That the suit is with the feds is notable in and of itself. T.E. McMorrow, the reporter who wrote our story, pointed out that there is a $75,000 threshold to bring a property claim before a federal judge. The nephew’s lawyer says the painting is worth at least that much. T.E., or Tom, as we call him, is skeptical; none of the portraitist’s works has gone for more than $850, he said.

But federal court is federal court, and it makes for better headlines and a greater likelihood that, as happened, multiple news outlets pick up a story. Still, at my usual Java Nation stop on Tuesday morning, none of the news-junkie regulars had heard of it. Even Andrew, who runs the place and knows everything, was in the dark.

So the question was what The Star should do. Should we wait for it to appear in print before putting it on our website or just go for it? We put it up, pushing the story out over Facebook and Twitter simultaneously. Interest was steady, if modest. A small item we had posted a few days earlier about the New York City restaurant chain Il Mulino held an insurmountable lead, followed closely by our coverage of a seal pup found scooting along a road in Amagansett in January. Everybody had heard about that.

As to the publicity value of the Jackie O painting, the nephew wins either way, by seeing his name go cross-platform from New York to London’s Daily Mail. And Mr. Wallace, who says the portrait is his legally and not for sale anyway, does too.