Description

"With crisp prose, fine research, and a clear moral purpose, Mary McNeil shines a light on Wallace Carroll and in so doing, powerfully illuminates the current troubles of journalism..."

"This well-told story of a gentleman journalist is a trip back in time to when that phrase did not strike most Americans as an oxymoron, and when vibrant local newspapers were both causes and effects of national vigor."

"This book is the discovery of a remarkable but undersung life, a well-researched and captivating read..."

Century's Witness tells the story of Wallace Carroll, the most respected and influential journalist of the 20th Century.

A United Press correspondent before and during World War II, Carroll was deputy director of the Office of War Information, news editor of the Washington Bureau of the New York Times, and finally editor and publisher of the Winston-Salem Journal and Sentinel. In a career that spanned 45 years, he covered most of the significant events of the century, from the St. Valentine's Day Massacre in 1929 to the end of the Vietnam War. Filled with "you are there" stories and interviews with the likes of Winston Churchill, Dwight Eisenhower, and Josef Stalin among others, Carroll represented the gold standard of news reporting. His example, as captured by Mary McNeil a former student of Carroll's, influenced a generation of reporters, editors, and publishers and gives us journalistic principles well-worth revisiting today. "Anyone who cares about the values of daily newspapers should read it," wrote Donald Graham, former publisher, The Washington Post.