AMERICAN JOURNALISM WINTER-SPRING 1992 Published by the American Journalism Historians Association 1^7 . A M !•: R IC AN JOIRNALISM WINTER-SPRING 1992 DEPARTMENTS ARTICLES •4* RESEARCH NOTES • Stephen Crane's New York City The Economics Journalism and the Oft-Told Tale of the New Journalism Literary Journalism ii\ the Daily Newspaper. •108» Michael Robertson 7 BOOK REVIEWS • ''Trifling with Edge Tools": Literacy Henry Adams's Letters in the United States to the New York Times, 1861-62 Reporting on Diplomacy from the Inside. If No News, Send Rumors John C. Bromley 23 Now the News • Tough Talk and Bad News: Satire and the New York Herald, 1835-1860 Preserving the Press James Gordon Bennett as a Neoclassidst. Gary L Whitby 35 Ignatius Donnelly • James Agee's Documentary Expression: Risky Business Let Us Now Praise Famous Men as Journalism The Man Who Was A Second Look at a Classic Work of Joximalism. Mark Twain Edna Boone Johnson and Mary Helen Brown 53 60 Minutes and the News • In the Wake of the News: The Beginnings of a Sports Column, by HEK Freedom Violence from Sportswriting as a Literary Art. Alfred Lawrence Lorenz 65 Crossing the Line • Historiographical Essay Minutes to Midnight Re-Viewing Rock Writing: The Origins of Popular Music Criticism The Invisible Weapon Telling the Story of Rock 'n' Roll. Steve Jones 87 and more . EDITOR EDITORIAL PURPOSE. notes, which are not blind John J. Pauly American Joumalis pub- refereed, may include dis- Tulsa lishes articles, research cussions of mediodology, ASSOCIATE EDITORS notes, book reviews, and reports of research in Patricia Bradley correspondence dealing progress, annotations on Temple with the history of jovur- new archival sources, Richard Lentz nalism. Sudt contributions commentaries on issues in Arizona State may focus on social, eco- journalism history, or sug- BOOK REVIEW EDITOR nomic, intellectual, politi- gestions for future re- Nancy Roberts cal, or legal issues. Ameri- search. Authors who wish Minrtesota can Journalism also wel- to contribute research DESIGN comes articles tiiat treat notes are invited to query %aron M. W. Bass the history of commvmica- the editor. Kansas tion in general; the history Anyone who wishes to ASSISTANTT EDITOR of broadcasting, advertis- review books for American Melissa Howard ing, and public relations; Journalism, or to propose a Tulsa tiie history of media out- book for review, should FORMER EDITORS side ttie United States; and contact Professor Nancy David Sloan theoretical issues in the lit- Roberts, Book Review Edi- Alabama erature or methods of me- tor, American Journalism, Gary Whitby dia history. School of Journalism and East Texas State SUBMISSIONS. All articles, Mass Communication, research notes, and corre- University of Minnesota, AMERICAN JOURNALISM spondence should be sent Minneapolis MN 55455. HISTORIANS to Professor John Patily, American Journalism is ASSOCIATION Editor, American Journal- produced on a Macintosh PRESIDENT ism, Faculty of Communi- computer, using Microsoft Nancy Roberts cation, University of Tulsa, Word and Pagemaker soft- Minnesota 600 S. CoUege Avenue, ware. Auti\ors of manu- VICE PRESIDENT Tulsa OK 74104. Authors scripts accepted for publi- Pamela Brown should send four copies of cation are encoviraged, but Rider College manuscripts submitted for not required, to submit SECRETARY pxiblication as articles. their work on a DOS or Donald Avery American Journalism fol- Macintosh disk. Samford lows ttie style requirements SUBSCRIPTIONS. BOARD OF DIRECTORS of tiie Chicago Manual of American Journalism (ISSN ^erilyn Bennion Style. The maximvun 0882-1127) is published Humboldt State length for most manu- quarterly by the American Elaine Berland scripts is twenty-five Journalism Historians As- Webster pages, not including notes sociation, at the University EdCaudill and tables. of Tulsa. Subscriptions to Tennessee All submissions are blind American Journalism cost Carol Sue Humphrey refereed by three readers, $25 a year, $10 for stu- Oklahoma Baptist and tf\e review process dents, and include a one- Frankie Hutton typically takes about three year membership in Lehigh mondis. Manuscripts will AJHA. Subscriptions Barbara Straus Reed be returned only if the au- mailed outside the United Rutgers thor has included a self- States cost $30 for surface Wm. David Sloan addressed stamped enve- mail, $35 for air mail. For Alabama lope. further information, James Startt Research notes are typi- please contact the Editor. Valparaiso cally three- to six-pages COPYRIGHT. © Ameri- Gary Whitby long, written without for- can Journalism Historians East Texas State mal documentation. Such Association, 1992. — REFEREES. Thanks to the following editorial board members, who have re- FROM THE EDITOR cently read maniiscripts for American Journalism.. ROLAND BARTHES used to speak of the "pleasure James Boylan of the text." By that phrase he meant to praise the Massachusetts sensuous possibilities of writing and reading. Like Lucy Caswell many contemporary literary critics his tastes ran Ohio State tovyrard what we now call ti\e postmodern; he fa- Jeremy Cohen vored texts that self-consdously (if not proudly) call Stanford attention to their own acts of narration, that play John De Mott with the reader's sense of reality, that Memphis State deny their own Hazel Dicken-Garda claims of authority and affirm the endlessly open Minnesota possibilities of language. WaUace Eberhard That is not how journalists tell the story of their Georgia literary calling, of course. Journalism has imagined Donald Fishman itself defending an Empire of Reality, solemnly pa- Boston College trolling the fact-fiction border alone in the darkness, Charles Frazer doggedly protecting a society in which most citizens Oregon remain indiflferent to the truth. Timothy Gleason The articles in this issue demonstrate that Oregon jour- nalism could offer William Himtzicker a different history of itself, how- Minnesota ever, if it chose to ask a different set of questions. Peggy Kreshel That alternative account would stress ti\e literary Georgia qualities of even the humblest newspaper story, and Louis Liebovich the nature of journalism as a writerly occupation. Illinois Michael Robertson's close reading of Stephen Marion Marzolf Crane's newspaper sketches, for example, portrays Michigan those sketches as richly and deliberately literary Michael Murray and superior, in many respects, to Crane's short fic- Missouri-St. Louis tion. This issue's other authors John Edward Nickerson — Bromley, Gary Delaware Whitby, Edna Boone Johnson and Mary Helen Norma Pecora Brown, Larry Lorenz, Steve Jones—similarly argue Emerson College that we need to understand journalistic writing as Steven Phipps we would any literary text: as a form of symbolic Indiana/Purdue at Ft. Wai/ne action. Lana Rakow Journalism will continue to labor in the service of Wisconsin-Parkside truth, and journalists will probably cc»itinue to imag- Barbara Straus Reed ine themselves as detectives, judges, therapists, busi- Rutgers ness managers, and concerned citizens. But these ar- John Soloski ticles remind us that those Iowa same journalists are also writers dream, Patrick Washburn who instigate, accuse, dissemble, Ohio wonder, play. Gilbert Williams -J.R Michigan State Howard Ziff Massachusetts RESEARCH NOTES THE ECONOMICS OFTHE reading habits from fiction own editorial niche. Esquire NEWJOURNAUSM: to nonfidion beginning in had not recovered its pre- THECASE0FES0U/f7£ America in the late fifties. war character following This shift showed vp first World War 11. Perhaps it JACK NEWFIELD de- in book publishing and did not need it Like the scribed New Joiimalism as then in magazines. An ex- rest of America, Esquire at amounting to gcxxl writers amination of Esquire's first may have been satis- being turned loose by wise tables of content fix>m fied with itself, sauntering editors on real subjects. It 1955 to 1964, for example, and re-grouping through is probably tiie most accu- reveals that the Janviary the fifties. Unfortunately, a rate description, in spite of 1955 issue listed six articles new men's magazine ap- all the words written to of fiction, and the January peared in 1953 and gave justify, explain, or con- 1961 issue orUy one work Esquire instant chase. demn this form of journal- of fiction. By January 1964 Within five years of its ism. the only fiction was the lavmch, Fhyhoy overtook This essay examines the first of eight installments Esquire in its circulation, role of the editor in the of Norman MaUer's serial- and the older magazine publishing of what came ized novel. An American foimd itself feidng a major to be called New Journal- Dream. The marke^lace challenge for its readership, ism in Esquire magazine. for writing and writers advertisers, and writers. Its premise is tiiat the or- was changing, and a few Varioxis accounts portray ganizational structure and wise editors would take the mood inside Esquire's economic imperatives of note of dus change and act editorial offices as bleak, in Esquire and odier maga- iq>oniL disarray, or in a state of zines played a crucial role Esquire would ofier a dynamic tension, depend- in the pid>lication of New home to the new non-fic- ing on whose version one Journalism. This explana- tion for at least two rea- reads. Founding editor tion, in turn, discounts to sons. First, Esquire had a Arnold Gingridi, brought some degree explanations history of being a writer's back on board to revive that treat the New Journal- magazine. This history be- the magazine, hired three ism as a literary phenom- gan with Arnold Gingrich young, aggressive, and enon arising out of die so- and his association with creative editors, all eager cial and political turmoil of writers such as Ernest to iiUierit his kingdom. the sixties. Hemingway, John Dos Thus began the 'l)lood on A great deal of informa- Passes, and F. Scott the walls" era, named after tion is already available on Fitzgerald. Harold Hayes, the weekly editorial meet- the writers who produced who became the chief edi- ings sangviinely presided New Journalism.