Dow Jones Snubbed Its Old Landlord

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November 27, 2007 | 4:16 p.m

When it came to securing Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal for Manhattan's biggest real estate auction, real estate tycoon Stephen Ross evidently beat Ric Clark to the punch.

In an interview with the Observer's Eliot Brown, Brookfield C.E.O. Ric Clark suggests that he tried to retain Dow Jones--which rents space in One World Financial Center, which Brookfield owns--for his proposal for the West Side before he found out that they already made plans.

I have to say that I did actually place the call to Dow Jones. Although when it comes to architects, we didn’t place a call to someone who was already locked up, I did place a call to Dow Jones and found out that they had already been working with Related.

Dow Jones is following along with the News Corporation-Related deal, which is planning a mini-Murdoch fantasy camp along 10th Avenue. Stephen Ross bragged, "We will have the studios over there, placing them in the right locations, using their brands, Fox Sports, Fox Business, The Wall Street Journal, taking these different things and using them to advantage, activating the space with them.”

Of course, this wouldn't be the first time that Dow Jones considered ditching downtown Manhattan, or for that matter, Mr. Clark. After the Sept. 11 attacks, the Observer reported that then managing editor Paul Steiger gave a rousing speech vowing to commit to downtown Manhattan and said, "We're not going to let the bastards chase us out of there."

Six months later, Dow Jones was looking at 150,000 square feet of available space in midtown. It ultimately opted to stay downtown and commit to Mr. Clark. At least then it did.