• by Erik Sass , February 24, 2009

The Hearst Corp. said that it may have to sell or shut down the San Francisco Chronicle if union members do not agree to significant job cuts among both union and non-union employees, the newspaper's Web site SFGate.com reported late Tuesday. Many big regional dailies have been tottering toward closure for the last couple of months, and the Chronicle's doom was often foretold.

Hearst says it lost $50 million on the business last year. The company has also been forced to close a number of big magazines, including CosmoGirl and Country Home. Also on their last legs are the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and the Rocky Mountain News, which both suffer from the disadvantage of competing with another newspaper in relatively small cities. While the SF Chronicle is the first big regional daily to close, dozens of small-town weeklies have been closed in the northeast by Journal Register Co., which this weekend declared bankruptcy. Philadelphia Newspapers LLC also declared bankruptcy this weekend.