Publishers: Larger Than Death

He spoke with neither resignation nor despair. But there was pride in a long lifetime of accomplishment, and his voice rang with the dauntless curiosity of an old man facing the diminishing future. "This is my final word," said William Maxwell Aitken, the first Baron Beaverbrook, at his 85th birthday party (TIME, June 5). It was, indeed, his valedictory. Last week at Cherkley, his gloomy Victorian estate in Surrey, the Beaver's heart, which had endured so long despite bouts with asthma, sciatica and gout, finally failed.

From longtime admirers and antagonists tributes flowed in for the man who put a...

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