Random House president
addresses future of journalism
FOOTNOTES
Tales and traditions of the press
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Adviser Update
‘My Paper Chase’
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Anne Whitt
is a 1997-98 Dow Jones Special
Recognition Adviser, 1999 Florida
Journalism Teacher of the Year and
2000 Distinguished Adviser in JEA’s
National Yearbook Adviser of the
Year competition. In 2002 NSPA and
JEA named her a Pioneer. In 2006
Florida Scholastic Press Association
gave her its Medallion. Her column,
“Whitt and Wisdom,” may be
read without membership at www.
Walsworth.com. Go to Resources
and then Columns. With her family
she also produces a community
publication. Whitt can be reached at
[email protected].
T
he Evans family read
faithfully newspapers
such as The Daily
Express. The papers assured
readers, “… Britain will not be
involved in a European War
this year, next year either.”
One front-page headline
described Dunkirk as “Bloody
Marvelous.” The story
explained how grateful the
British soldiers were to be in
Dunkirk and any who returned
home to Britain looked for
opportunities to return to the
conflict.
So 12-year-old Harold
Evans and his father were
surprised when they returned
to Rhyl beach for summer
vacation to find their beach
cluttered with bodies of men.
The curious father talked with
the men and learned they had
just arrived back in England
from Dunkirk. They were war
weary and not at all excited
to return to the war as papers
had led Britain to believe.
The discrepancy between
what the newspapers had told
readers and reality so visibly
bewildered the boy. He says,
“This epiphany shook my
faith in the printed word, but
it did not make me averse to
newspapers. On the contrary,
as I entered my teens I grew
even more eager to involve
myself in their mysteries. So
began my paper chase.”
The rest of the book tells
stories of the journalist’s three
major career successes: to be
allowed to study journalism
at Durham even though he
had not passed the grammar
school exam; to rise rapidly
in the field in Britain; and
then to rise rapidly in the field
of journalism in the United
States.
The U.S. venture began
with a Harkness Fellowship
at University of Chicago.
Evans was quickly impressed
with the differences in the
quality of reporting in the
two countries. He says,
“It was, I came to see, the
differences between two
cultures: a British population
conditioned to limited access;
the Americans demanding
openness.” His biggest regret
of that segment was that
he arrived a year too late to
know Col. McCormick at the
Tribune.
Evans became president of
Random House in 1990.
The 544-page book, filled
with new information on
classic subjects for Evans’
work, has earned acclaim in
the United Kingdom and the
United States.
About the future of
journalism, Evans says, “In
the end it is not the delivery
system that counts. It is what
is delivered.”