records of Kane's boyhood guardian, Thatcher. The scene comes to life in midwinter at the Kane boarding house. Kane's mother has come into one of the richest gold mines in the world through a defaulting boarder, and at age twenty-five, Kane will inherit his sixty million dollars (Citizen Kane). His mother is doubtful of the quality of the education her son will receive in Colorado, and therefore wishes to send her son to study with Thatcher. Hearst's parents came by their money through gold mines (Swanberg 5), so both Hearst and Kane were raised with "golden" spoons in their respective mouths. Kane is unusually devoted to his mother, as shown when he turns away from his father to listen to his mother, and when he only pays heed to his mother's answers to his questions (Citizen Kane). Hearst likewise was completely devoted to his mother. He was sheltered from the real world by his mother and her money for most of his young life, rarely even seeing his traveling father (Swanberg 25). Also, Kane's dying word and the name of his childhood sled, "Rosebud," (Citizen Kane) was the name of a town twenty miles east of where Hearst's parents were born and grew up (Robinson 13). Everything from the newsreel at the start of the film on Kane's life matches Hearst's almost perfectly. Kane ran over thirty newspapers, radios, and syndicates, had a well publicized romantic affair, tried in vain to be elected to public office, was totally and completely careless with his money, (always expecting there would be much more coming), and built himself a pleasure palace called Xanadu, which included a gigantic collection of statues and animals (Citizen Kane). Hearst also did all these things over the course of his life, which further served to convince movie viewers of Welles' libelous intentions in the making of the movie. (Swanberg). After the opening newsreel on Hearst's life, the movie goes through the boyhood scene where Thatcher takes Kane away from his...
