Books
Katherine Graham, Personal History (e-book) (New York: Rosetta Books, 2004)
(paperback ) (New York: Vintage, 1998) Her father bought the struggling Washington Post in 1933, and nursed it to health; her husband ran the paper until his suicide in 1963. This book traces Graham's rise in a male-dominated industry, from subservient wife to the powerful publisher of one of the world's most influential newspapers.
Thomas C. Leonard, News for All: America's Coming-of-Age with the Press (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995) A study of nineteenth century newspapers, arguing that the quest for profit is woven into American journalism and that today's profit motive is better understood if it is not seen as a fall from grace.
Nan Robertson, The Girls in the Balcony, reprint (Lincoln, NE: Backinprint.com, 2001) When Robertson started at The New York Times in 1963, women covering speeches of the world's leaders at the all male National Press Club were forced to stand on a tiny balcony. There they were "squeezed together, lunchless, and barely able to hear the speakers' words, while the club members and guests sat downstairs on the ballroom floor, luxuriating over their four-course meals" this treatment came to symbolize the way women were treated at the Times and other newspapers, treatment that led to the successful class-action sex discrimination suit that is the central theme of this book.
Films, Videos, and DVDs
All the President's Men (1976, rated PG) A classic, starring Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman as real-life Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, investigating and breaking the story of the Watergate scandal.
The Front Page (1931, rated NR) Starring Adolphe Menjou and Pat O'Brien as a battling editor and reporter in 1920's Chicago.
The Front Page (1974, rated PG) A remake of the 1931 original, directed by Billy Wilder and starring Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau and Carol Burnett.
The Paper (1994, rated R) Twenty-four hours in the hectic life of a metropolitan daily and its editors, working against a deadline. Starring Michael Keaton and Glenn Close; directed by Ron Howard.
Nothing Sacred (1937 NR) A hilarious commentary on media profiteering. This classic screwball comedy satirized the exploitative tendencies of newspapers of the time, which were willing to sell newspapers by tugging at the heartstrings of the American public. A New York paper thinks its hit the jackpot with the story of Hazel Flagg, a young woman thought to be suffering from radium poisoning. However, Hazel finds out she's not sick at all, just before her entry to media world, but decides to go for the free trip to New York anyway.
