ISSUE

Summer-Fall 2018

Nieman 80: Journalism That Makes a Difference

How are great journalists made? Often, it’s pieces of great journalism that help form them, influencing their lives or careers in an indelible way. To celebrate the Nieman Foundation for Journalism’s 80th anniversary in 2018, we asked Nieman Fellows to share works of journalism that in some way left a significant mark on them, their work or their beat, their country, or their culture. The result is what Nieman curator Ann Marie Lipinski calls “an accidental curriculum that has shaped generations of journalists”—a collection of 80 articles and investigations, books, photos, cartoons, podcasts, virtual reality installations, and more, works that have endured long after Niemans first read, listened, or viewed them. Niemans reflect on the 80 pieces of journalism that have influenced them most.

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Articles

The Nieman 80
Nieman 80

The Nieman 80

On the 80th anniversary of the Nieman Foundation, Nieman Fellows reflect on the journalism that’s left an indelible mark on them and their careers
September 20, 2018
Pamela Spaulding, NF ’85
Nieman 80

Pamela Spaulding, NF ’85

Early in my career I was deeply affected by the photographs of the Farm Security Administration (FSA). It is a visual record of American life between 1935 and 1944. [sidebar…
September 20, 2018
Abdul Waheed Wafa, NF ’11
Nieman 80

Abdul Waheed Wafa, NF ’11

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]My childhood in Afghanistan coincided with a communist regime under which we had access only to government-sponsored media,…
September 20, 2018
Bill Marimow, NF ’83
Nieman 80

Bill Marimow, NF ’83

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]When I first read this front-page dispatch by Sydney H. Schanberg of The New York Times in May…
September 20, 2018
Jassim Ahmad, NF ’17
Nieman 80

Jassim Ahmad, NF ’17

I have sampled a lot of virtual reality (VR) that has left me feeling confused and frustrated. Then I discovered “Notes on Blindness: Into Darkness.” It centers on the audio…
September 20, 2018
Harald Pakendorf, NF ’69
Nieman 80

Harald Pakendorf, NF ’69

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]Joe Lelyveld’s reporting for The New York Times—which he drew on for his book “Move Your Shadow”—brought home…
September 20, 2018
Tara Pixley, NF ’16
Nieman 80

Tara Pixley, NF ’16

“Beyond 7 Billion,” the Los Angeles Times’s five-part series, melds excellent writing with stunning visual journalism. It connects global overpopulation to terrorism, environmental collapse, starvation, politicization of birth control, and…
September 20, 2018
Tim Giago, NF ’91
Nieman 80

Tim Giago, NF ’91

The fever for gold caused the Lakota people’s loss of the Sacred Black Hills of South Dakota as well as the near destruction of the indigenous peoples of South and…
September 20, 2018
Paul Lieberman, NF ’80
Nieman 80

Paul Lieberman, NF ’80

Edgar Snow avoided grandiosity when he achieved one of the great scoops of the 20th century by hooking up with China’s Red Army in 1936. “I do not intend to…
September 20, 2018
Lisa Stone, NF ’02
Nieman 80

Lisa Stone, NF ’02

The April 2018 issue of Vanity Fair featured a photo of 26 Black women entrepreneurs—each of whom had raised more than $1 million in capital. I trace the origins of…
September 20, 2018
Wahyu Dhyatmika, NF ’15
Nieman 80

Wahyu Dhyatmika, NF ’15

The mass killings in Indonesia in 1965-’66 left a deep mark on the nation’s collective psyche. Watching the documentary “The Act of Killing” about the atrocity when it was first…
September 20, 2018
Megan O’Grady, NF ’12
Nieman 80

Megan O’Grady, NF ’12

When I met Brit Bennett, in 2016, it was to discuss her first novel, “The Mothers,” a Baldwin-inspired tale of the friendship between two Southern California girls growing up amid…
September 20, 2018
Phillip Martin, NF ’98
Nieman 80

Phillip Martin, NF ’98

The late Danny Schechter’s examination of apartheid-era South Africa shaped my path from radio intern in the 1970s to senior investigative reporter at WGBH in Boston exploring social injustice. Schechter,…
September 20, 2018
Wonbo Woo, NF ’16
Nieman 80

Wonbo Woo, NF ’16

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]Robert Krulwich is best known today as the co-host of NPR’s “Radiolab.” But before launching the pioneering podcast…
September 20, 2018
Maciek Nabrdalik, NF ’17
Nieman 80

Maciek Nabrdalik, NF ’17

In the summer of 2015 while I was in Greece documenting the refugee crisis I had a disturbing encounter with another photojournalist. He said he doesn’t like it when refugees…
September 20, 2018
Johanna van Eeden, NF ’15
Nieman 80

Johanna van Eeden, NF ’15

It is April 1994. I’m a final year student at a university in South Africa—on the threshold of a career in journalism. It is eerily quiet on campus. Most of…
September 20, 2018
Dina Temple-Raston, NF ’14
Nieman 80

Dina Temple-Raston, NF ’14

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]You don’t find books; books find you. That’s what essayist Joseph Epstein told us in our writing classes…
September 20, 2018
Stuart Watson, NF ’08
Nieman 80

Stuart Watson, NF ’08

When I was just a kid growing up in Albany, Georgia, I pulled down from my dad’s bookcases a coffee-table book published by Life magazine. On page 460 in “The…
September 20, 2018
Linda Robinson, NF ’01
Nieman 80

Linda Robinson, NF ’01

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]My ninth-grade civics and American history teacher Miss Keister gave me “Winners and Losers” by Gloria Emerson, among…
September 20, 2018
Nieman 80

Alison MacAdam, NF ’14

I still remember where I was when I heard this story. It was night. I was driving alone—the best time to listen to the radio.[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman…
September 20, 2018
Steve Northup, NF ’74
Nieman 80

Steve Northup, NF ’74

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]“Up Front” is a collection of Bill Mauldin’s World War II cartoons featuring Willie and Joe, a pair…
September 20, 2018
Subina Shrestha, NF ’17
Nieman 80

Subina Shrestha, NF ’17

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]Growing up in Nepal under the autocratic monarchy I did not know that journalists could tell stories about…
September 20, 2018
Eli Reed, NF ’83
Nieman 80

Eli Reed, NF ’83

My appreciation for the long-form photographic essay began with work published in Life magazine. A number of photo essays captured my attention. Two by legendary Life photographer W. Eugene Smith…
September 20, 2018
Rami Khouri, NF ’02
Nieman 80

Rami Khouri, NF ’02

I first read Jeffrey Fleishman’s 2007 article about poor roof dwellers in Cairo nearly 10 years after he wrote it, while I was teaching a course at the American University…
September 20, 2018
Conroy Chino, NF '84
Nieman 80

Conroy Chino, NF ’84

Literature was my first love, but journalism fulfilled a purpose—the chance to right wrongs. I became aware of the visual power of television and the spoken word. I was influenced…
September 20, 2018
Yvonne van der Heijden, NF ’86
Nieman 80

Yvonne van der Heijden, NF ’86

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]The work that made a difference to me as a new journalist is “Der Aufmacher: Der Mann, der…
September 20, 2018
Robert Socha, NF ’17
Nieman 80

Robert Socha, NF ’17

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]“1920 Diary” by Isaac Babel has resonated with me for many years. Babel was a Russian-born journalist and…
September 20, 2018
Katherine Fulton, NF ’93
Nieman 80

Katherine Fulton, NF ’93

Nieman 80 More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them I have often been inspired by beautifully reported and written narrative histories that bring the “deeper news” to life.…
September 20, 2018
Michael Fitzgerald, NF ’11
Nieman 80

Michael Fitzgerald, NF ’11

I discovered Dorothy Thompson when I needed something from the 1930s to fill out a class I was teaching on narrative reporting. Her reports on the rise of Hitler were…
September 20, 2018
Nieman 80

Michelle Boorstein, NF ’17

I read “Next of Kin” in 2002 and it changed my sense of what is possible in journalism. After reading it, I became a fanatic follower and student of David…
September 20, 2018
Joshua Prager, NF ’11
Nieman 80

Joshua Prager, NF ’11

The New York Times critic A.O. Scott once observed that great novels often “blend private destinies with public events.” So too with great nonfiction; it was the private sufferings of…
September 20, 2018
Jeneé Osterheldt, NF ’17
Nieman 80

Jeneé Osterheldt, NF ’17

It was all a dream. I used to read Word Up! Magazine. And The Source, Vibe, and XXL.[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]I…
September 20, 2018
Bruce Stannard, NF ’83
Nieman 80

Bruce Stannard, NF ’83

The America’s Cup in the summer of 1983 was not only the longest and most intensive assignment of my career—one that went on day and night for four months—but it…
September 20, 2018
Nieman 80

Nancy Webb, NF ’84

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]Growing up, I craved a more significant existence than seemed available in rural Kentucky. Climbing the ladder as…
September 20, 2018
Gabe Bullard, NF ’15
Nieman 80

Gabe Bullard, NF ’15

Sometime around the point when “Saturday Night Live” did a parody of “Serial,” a joke passed among audio producers that “Serial” invented podcasts. It didn’t, of course, but in a…
September 20, 2018
Ana Lourdes Cárdenas, NF ’01
Nieman 80

Ana Lourdes Cárdenas, NF ’01

Some stories endure, not simply because of the subject matter but for the depth of reporting and quality of writing. Sonia Nazario’s masterpiece “Enrique’s Journey” is without a question one…
September 20, 2018
Lolly Bowean, NF ’17
Nieman 80

Lolly Bowean, NF ’17

In her illustrious, richly crafted book “The Warmth of Other Suns,” Isabel Wilkerson brilliantly shows the journey that many African-Americans embarked on during the Great Migration. But it’s another Wilkerson…
September 20, 2018
Lorie Conway, NF ’94
Nieman 80

Lorie Conway, NF ’94

I had never heard of the musician Sixto Rodriguez before watching “Searching for Sugar Man,” the recipient of both the American Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and the British…
September 20, 2018
Dolly Katz, NF ’77
Nieman 80

Dolly Katz, NF ’77

In an investigation published in 1972, the Omaha Sun, a weekly newspaper with not much money or staff, ferreted out the huge amounts of money Boys Town, a nonprofit to…
September 20, 2018
Fungai Tichawangana, NF ’16
Nieman 80

Fungai Tichawangana, NF ’16

I grew up seeing Tony Namate’s cartoons, and when, around 1991, he started doing independent political cartoons and then joined the Daily News, his work took on a major significance—not…
September 20, 2018
Nieman 80

Naomi Darom, NF ’16

By the time I read “No Logo” in 2005 I had been working in advertising for five years, and came to question what my brain power was being used for.…
September 20, 2018
Jason Grotto, NF ’15
Nieman 80

Jason Grotto, NF ’15

One of the defining moments of my journalism career came when I read “The Great Tax Giveaway” by the legendary Philadelphia Inquirer reporting duo Don Barlett and James Steele. I…
September 20, 2018
Jieqi Luo, NF ’15
Nieman 80

Jieqi Luo, NF ’15

“The Death of Detainee Sun Zhigang” from 2003 was such a tremendous benchmark, shiny and high, for Chinese journalism. The story led to the initiation of a civil movement calling…
September 20, 2018
Nieman 80

Carlos Eduardo Huertas, NF ’12

Like so many revolutionary entrepreneurial endeavors, CONNECTAS began in a basement. It was there in Lippmann House that I sketched out a work plan. The nonprofit CONNECTAS, launched in 2013,…
September 20, 2018
Laura Lynch, NF ’00
Nieman 80

Laura Lynch, NF ’00

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]I first saw the magnificent three-part documentary series “The Champions” when I was in journalism school in Ottawa.…
September 20, 2018
Nieman 80

Paula Molina, NF ’13

It’s late at night. I have school tomorrow, and I know it’s time for me to be in bed. But I’m sitting in the family car with my dad. There’s…
September 20, 2018
David Hawpe, NF ’75
Nieman 80

David Hawpe, NF ’75

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]The journalism that most influenced me was Robert Caro’s book “The Power Broker.” One of its messages is…
September 20, 2018
Re-examining Lippmann's Legacy
Features

Re-examining Lippmann’s Legacy

Journalists are still grappling with many of the issues that defined Walter Lippmann’s extraordinary career
Michael Petrou
September 20, 2018
James S. Doyle, NF ’65
Nieman 80

James S. Doyle, NF ’65

The leadership of our government became unhinged after 9/11/2001. It took me a long time to face that, and even longer to figure out how and why it happened.[sidebar style=”right”…
September 20, 2018
Emily O’Reilly, NF ’88
Nieman 80

Emily O’Reilly, NF ’88

At first glance, “Lost Lives,” this extended piece of journalism in book form, looks like a simple list of names with some brief notes attached to each entry, but to me…
September 20, 2018
Robert H. Giles, NF ’66
Nieman 80

Robert H. Giles, NF ’66

As World War II stretched into 1944, it became part of the daily ritual in our household on Cleveland’s west side to keep up with the war news in the…
September 20, 2018
Ray Jenkins, NF ’65
Nieman 80

Ray Jenkins, NF ’65

The 31,000-word article filled the entire Aug. 31, 1946 issue of The New Yorker magazine—the first anniversary of the detonation of the first atomic bomb at the close of World…
September 20, 2018
Christopher Weyant, NF ’16
Nieman 80

Christopher Weyant, NF ’16

It was the mid-1980s when I read my first Pat Oliphant cartoon. I was a teenager prowling around in the back of a dusty used bookstore searching for cartoons. Sandwiched…
September 20, 2018
Clarence Jones, NF ’64
Nieman 80

Clarence Jones, NF ’64

As a newspaper reporter, I looked down my nose at TV “talent” who called themselves journalists. My colleagues and I thought TV reporters were hired for their looks and their…
September 20, 2018
Nieman 80

Stan Grossfeld, NF ’92

I can close my eyes and still see the classic W. Eugene Smith portrait of the mother bathing her daughter who was deformed by mercury poisoning in Minamata, Japan.It is…
September 20, 2018
Claudia Méndez Arriaza, NF ’12
Nieman 80

Claudia Méndez Arriaza, NF ’12

When I read “Murder Comes for the Bishop” by Francisco Goldman, I was 22 and in my first year as a journalist. The criminal investigation and the trial following the…
September 20, 2018
Edward Wong, NF ’18 and Jo Thomas, NF ’71
Nieman 80

Edward Wong, NF ’18 and Jo Thomas, NF ’71

Edward Wong, NF ’18Sometime in my 20s, when I was starting out as a reporter, I read two collections of Joan Didion’s early articles and essays. They changed the way…
September 20, 2018
Alex S. Jones, NF ’82
Nieman 80

Alex S. Jones, NF ’82

It was the mid-’60s and I was in college and a guy I had never heard of—an alumnus of my college [Washington and Lee University] as it happened—was coming to…
September 20, 2018
Jerrold Schecter, NF ’64
Nieman 80

Jerrold Schecter, NF ’64

When “Khrushchev Remembers” first appeared in Life magazine and as a Little, Brown book, in 1970, about five years after he was ousted from power and forced to live 20…
September 20, 2018
Anita Harris, NF ’82
Nieman 80

Anita Harris, NF ’82

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]A newly minted college grad, in 1970, I happened to catch a rerun of “Harvest of Shame” on…
September 20, 2018
Nieman 80

Mary Jordan, NF ’90

“Mrs. Kelly’s Monster” has never left me.“The heartbeat goes pop, pop, pop, 70 beats a minute.”[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]In his December…
September 20, 2018
Mary Meehan, NF ’16
Nieman 80

Mary Meehan, NF ’16

At the Kentucky Derby women wear ridiculously elaborate hats and heels they regret within the hour. The horses are sleek and strong and beautiful. And, bonus, there’s always bourbon.When Seattle…
September 20, 2018
Bill Kovach, NF ’89
Nieman 80

Bill Kovach, NF ’89

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]Izzy Stone taught a generation of reporters the bedrock principle that a reporter should never start with the…
September 20, 2018
Victor McElheny, NF ’63
Nieman 80

Victor McElheny, NF ’63

A reporter’s fateful question on March 31, 1954 led to the story that had more influence on my lifetime of science reporting than any other. The answer, symbolizing an age…
September 20, 2018
Wenxin Fan, NF ’16
Nieman 80

Wenxin Fan, NF ’16

The story “Who Owns Luneng?”, now back online, was censored immediately after Caijing Magazine published it in January 2007. At newsstands, the magazine was bought up not by readers, but…
September 20, 2018
Morton Mintz, NF ’64
Nieman 80

Morton Mintz, NF ’64

I began in journalism at The University of Michigan student newspaper and became a fan of investigative journalist I.F. Stone’s weekly newsletter and the way he mined government documents to…
September 20, 2018
Kalpana Jain, NF ’09
Nieman 80

Kalpana Jain, NF ’09

I entered journalism in the late 1980s—about 40 years after India gained freedom from British colonial rule. The media environment, in large part, was shaped by this colonial history. Many…
September 20, 2018
Steve Oney, NF ’82
Nieman 80

Steve Oney, NF ’82

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]One of the eternal struggles for journalists is between the need to belong to something bigger than themselves…
September 20, 2018
María Ramírez, NF ’18
Nieman 80

María Ramírez, NF ’18

[sidebar style=”right” head=”Nieman 80″ deck=””]More Nieman Fellows on exemplary journalism that influenced them[/sidebar]“The Money Shot” is a story about the male porn industry in Los Angeles and the suicide of…
September 20, 2018
Tangeni Amupadhi, NF ’07
Nieman 80

Tangeni Amupadhi, NF ’07

In my 11 years at The Namibian, Namibia’s largest daily newspaper, we have never published an investigative story that was more widely read than one earlier this year about a…
September 20, 2018
Julia Keller, NF ’98
Nieman 80

Julia Keller, NF ’98

As cultural critic at the Chicago Tribune for a dozen years, I was sometimes called upon to write the big, epic think pieces that necessarily follow in the wake of…
September 20, 2018
Nieman 80

Andreas Harsono, NF ’00

Indonesia’s transition since 1998 from the Suharto military dictatorship to democracy has presented journalists with many challenges. Indonesia’s Press Council estimates the country now has 43,000 news organizations from fewer…
September 20, 2018
Uncategorized

“Harvard Helped Form Lippmann’s Mind”

It would be no surprise to be told that young Walter Lippmann conquered Harvard, conquered its challenges with his intelligence, ambition and wide-ranging curiosity. That one would expect. But he…
Ronald Steel
September 10, 2018