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7
2011 ANNUAL REPORT
So is our balance sheet. We ended the year with
$565 million of debt (most of it due in 2019)
and $745 million in cash and investments. We’re
ready to invest when good opportunities arise.
And arise they will. Franklyn Scholar and Carrick
are typical of the kinds of add-on education
opportunities we like. We’re also listening to own-
ers who want to sell businesses in fields other
than education and media — if the owners want
to stay and run those businesses after a sale.
We made one excellent investment last year,
repurchasing more than 600,000 shares of our
own stock. In 2010 and 2011, we repurchased
roughly 18% of our outstanding shares, increas-
ing your ownership by that amount.
We are losing a valued adviser from our
board: John Dotson, formerly publisher of two
newspapers and an old Newsweek hand, will
retire in May. John, one of my first bosses at
The Post Company, has been an important
adviser for decades.
Bo Jones, vice chairman of the Company, left
at year-end to become CEO of MacNeil/Lehrer
Productions. Bo has been one of my wisest
counselors for more than 30 years; he was an
outstanding president and then publisher of
the Post. I will miss him and envy the folks at
MacNeil/Lehrer.
We were lucky to add an outstanding new
director to our board — Larry Thompson, for-
mer deputy attorney general of the United
States and retired general counsel of PepsiCo.
DONALD E. GRAHAM
Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Ocer
February 24, 2012
In November, hundreds of us at The Washington Post Company
lost a dear friend. Chris Ma, at the time of his death, was senior
vice president–strategy and development. He died of a sudden
heart attack.
Wise, patient and caring, Chris contributed in a hundred dif-
ferent ways. He was a writer and editor at Newsweek, the
second editor of washingtonpost.com and a contributor on
every one of our digital projects since we first published on
the Internet. Chris was the founder and publisher of Express,
our 180,000-circulation free newspaper. He was also the infor-
mal adviser to everyone in the building with an innovative idea,
from the newest-hired intern at Express to Ben Bradlee.