After his graduation from Harvard University in 1938, Randolph Hearst joined the family business, the Hearst Corporation. Long active in management of the San Francisco Examiner, he eventually became chairman of the Hearst board. He retired in favor of his nephew, George Randolph Hearst, Jr. Randolph Hearst never had the opportunity to become Chief Executive Officer. His father's will established a trust that had five family and eight non-family trustees. All trustees served for life and elected their successors, which maintained the proportions of family and non-family trustees. The trustees name the corporation's board of directors, and the trust does not dissolve until all grandchildren of William Randolph Hearst alive at his death have died. It was under Randolph Hearst's chairmanship that the chief executive inherited from his father, Richard E. Berlin, finally retired, but the next three presidents were all also non-family trustees. Randolph Hearst was married three times, first in 1938 to Catherine Wood Campbell of Atlanta, Georgia, who was the mother of his five daughters: Catherine, Virginia, Patricia, Anne and Victoria. Catherine Hearst was a Roman Catholic and a conservative Regent of the University of California before resigning in 1976. In 1974, Patty Hearst made front pages nationwide when she was kidnapped by an extremist group, the Symbionese Liberation Army, and was soon after caught on film helping the group to rob banks. She renounced the SLA soon after her arrest. The ordeal placed enormous strain on the Hearst marriage, eventually leading to divorce. After their divorce, the first Mrs. Hearst moved to Beverly Hills. Randolph Hearst married his second wife, Maria Cynthia Scruggs, originally of Rome, Italy, on 2 May 1982 The couple divorced in 1987. That year he married a third wife, Veronica de Gruyter that same year. Thirteen years later, the third Mrs. Hearst survived him and inherited from Hearst after he died at the age of 85. His seat as a trustee of his father's will went to Virginia Hearst Randt, second-oldest of his five daughters.
