By Pat Loeb

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – A landmark on the Philadelphia skyline undergoes a major, if invisible, change, beginning this evening. The Inquirer and Daily News building, a white tower four blocks north of City Hall, has a new owner and the papers are moving out.

The move is a byproduct of the tumult at the papers in recent years: the rapid change of ownership that gave hedge funds the deed long enough to sell the building, which is a bit like the Hollywood set of a newspaper building.

“The white tower of truth … “

Inquirer reporter Paul Nussbaum has worked there for decades but, though he finds the building is striking from the outside, he says the inside is more prosaic.

“It’s sort of like an insurance office — people sitting in cubicles, murmuring into telephones and tapping on keyboards.”

And, Nussbaum is not one to over romanticize it.

“The outside is pretty gorgeous, but once you get inside it’s kind of like a submarine, so I’m not going to miss a whole lot about this building to tell you the truth.”

The important things, reporters agree, are the stories that come out of that work, which can be done anywhere, even in the smaller quarters of their new home, the old Strawbridge’s building.

Meanwhile, the tower’s new owner plans to convert it to a hotel.