McClure's (cover, Jan, 1901) published many early muckraker articles.

The term muckraker is closely associated with reform-oriented journalists who wrote largely for popular magazines, continued a tradition of investigative journalism reporting, and emerged in the United States after 1900 and continued to be influential until World War I, when through a combination of advertising boycotts, dirty tricks and patriotism, the movement, associated with the Progressive Era in the United States, came to an end.^[1]

Before World War I, the term "muckraker" was used to refer in a general sense to a writer who investigates and publishes truthful reports to perform an auditing or watchdog function. In contemporary use, the term describes either a journalist who writes in the adversarial or alternative tradition or a non-journalist whose purpose in publication is to advocate reform and change.^{[citation needed]} Investigative journalists view the muckrakers as early influences and a continuation of watchdog journalism.^{[citation needed]}

The term is a reference to a character in John Bunyan's classic Pilgrim's Progress, "the Man with the Muck-rake" that rejected salvation to focus on filth. It became popular after President Theodore Roosevelt referred to the character in a 1906 speech.

History[link]

While a literature of reform had already appeared by the mid-19th century, the kind of reporting that would come to be called "muckraking" began to appear around 1900.^[2] By the 1900s, magazines such as Collier's Weekly, Munsey's Magazine and McClure's Magazine were already in wide circulation and read avidly by the growing middle class.^[3][4] The January 1903 issue of McClure's is considered to be the official beginning of muckraking journalism,^[5] although the muckrakers would get their label later. Ida M. Tarbell ("The History of Standard Oil"), Lincoln Steffens ("The Shame of Minneapolis") and Ray Stannard Baker ("The Right to Work"), simultaneously published famous works in that single issue. Claude H. Wetmore and Lincoln Steffens' previous article "Tweed Days in St. Louis", in McClure's October 1902 issue was called the first muckraking article.

Changes in journalism prior to 1903[link]

Julius Chambers

Nellie Bly

The muckrakers would become known for their investigative journalism. Investigations of corruption and social problems had already been introduced into the newspapers of the late 19th century by publishers and journalists during the eras of "personal journalism" —a term historians Emery and Emery used in The Press and America (6th ed.) to describe the 19th century newspapers that were steered by strong leaders with an editorial voice (p. 173)— and yellow journalism.

The muckrakers were influenced by both eras. One of the biggest urban scandals of the post-Civil War era was the corruption and bribery case of Tammany boss William M. Tweed in 1871 that was uncovered by newspapers. Lincoln Steffens titled his first muckraking article "Tweed Days in St. Louis" in comparison with the New York case. While some muckrakers had already worked for reform newspapers of the personal journalism variety, such as Steffens who was a reporter for the New York Evening Post under Edwin Lawrence Godkin,^[6] other muckrakers had worked for yellow journals before moving on to magazines around 1900, such as Charles Edward Russell who was a journalist and editor of Joseph Pulitzer's New York World.^[7] Publishers of yellow journals, such as Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst, were more intent on increasing circulation through scandal, crime, entertainment and sensationalism.^[8]

Just as the muckrakers became well known for their crusades, journalists from the eras of "personal journalism" and "yellow journalism" had gained fame through their investigative articles, including articles that exposed wrongdoing:

Julius Chambers, New York Tribune, is considered by many to be the original muckraker^{[citation needed]}. Chambers undertook a journalistic investigation of Bloomingdale Asylum in 1872, having himself committed with the help of some of his friends and his newspaper's city editor. His intent was to obtain information about alleged abuse of inmates. When articles and accounts of the experience were published in the Tribune, it led to the release of twelve patients who were not mentally ill, a reorganization of the staff and administration of the institution and, eventually, to a change in the lunacy laws.^[9] This later led to the publication of the book A Mad World and Its Inhabitants (1876). From this time onward, Chambers was frequently invited to speak on the rights of the mentally ill and the need for proper facilities for their accommodation, care and treatment.^[10]

Nellie Bly, another yellow journalist, used the undercover technique of investigation in reporting "Ten Days In The Mad-House," her 1887 exposé on patient abuse at Bellevue Mental Hospital, first published as a series of articles in The World newspaper and then as a book. Nellie would go on to write more articles on corrupt politicians, sweat-shop working conditions and other societal injustices.

Other works that predate the muckrakers[link]

• Helen Hunt Jackson (1831–1885) — A Century of Dishonor, U.S. policy regarding Native Americans.
• Henry Demarest Lloyd (1847–1903) — Wealth Against Commonwealth, exposed the corruption within the Standard Oil Company.
• Ida B. Wells (1862–1931) — an author of a series of articles concerning Jim Crow laws and the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad in 1884, and co-owned the newspaper The Free Speech in Memphis in which she began an anti-lynching campaign.
• Ambrose Bierce (1842–1913(?)) — author of a long-running series of articles published from 1883 through 1896 in The Wasp and the San Francisco Examiner attacking the Big Four and the Central Pacific Railroad for political corruption.

The muckrakers appeared at a moment when journalism was undergoing changes in style and practice.^{[citation needed]} In response to yellow journalism, which had exaggerated facts, objective journalism, as exemplified by The New York Times under Adolph Ochs after 1896, turned away from sensationalism and reported facts with the intention of being impartial and a newspaper of record.^[11] The growth of wire services had also contributed to the spread of the objective reporting style. Muckraking publishers like Samuel S. McClure, also emphasized factual reporting,^[5] but he also wanted what historian Michael Schudson had identified as one of the preferred qualities of journalism at the time, namely, the mixture of "reliability and sparkle" to interest a mass audience.^[12] In contrast with objective reporting, the journalists, whom Roosevelt dubbed "muckrakers", saw themselves primarily as reformers and were politically engaged.^[13] Journalists of the previous eras were not linked to a single political, populist movement as the muckrakers were associated with Progressive reforms. While the muckrakers continued the investigative exposures and sensational traditions of yellow journalism, they wrote to change society. Their work reached a mass audience as circulation figures of the magaziness rose on account of visibility and public interest.^{[citation needed]}

Magazines[link]

Magazines were the leading outlets for muckraking journalism. Samuel S. McClure and John Sanborn Phillips started McClure's Magazine in May 1893. McClure led the magazine industry by cutting the price of an issue to 15 cents, attracting advertisers, giving audiences illustrations and well-written content and then raising ad rates after increased sales, with Munsey's and Cosmopolitan following suit.^[14]

McClure sought out and hired talented writers, like the then unknown Ida M. Tarbell or the seasoned journalist and editor Lincoln Steffens. The magazine's pool of writers were associated with the muckraker movement, such as Ray Stannard Baker, Burton J. Hendrick, George Kennan (explorer), John Moody (financial analyst), Henry Reuterdahl, George Kibbe Turner, and Judson C. Welliver, and their names adorned the front covers. The other magazines associated with muckraking journalism were American Magazine (Lincoln Steffens), Arena (G.W. Galvin and John Moody), Collier's Weekly (Samuel Hopkins Adams, C.P. Connolly, L.R. Glavis, Will Irwin, J.M. Oskison, Upton Sinclair), Cosmopolitan (Josiah Flynt, Alfred Henry Lewis, Jack London, Charles P. Norcross, Charles Edward Russell), Everybody's Magazine (William Hard, Thomas William Lawson, Benjamin B. Lindsey, Frank Norris, David Graham Phillips, Charles Edward Russell, Upton Sinclair, Lincoln Steffens, Merrill A. Teague, Bessie and Marie Van Vorst), Hampton's (Rheta Childe Dorr, Benjamin B. Hampton, John L. Mathews, Charles Edward Russell, and Judson C. Welliver), The Independent (George Walbridge Perkins, Sr.), Outlook (William Hard), Pearson's Magazine (Alfred Henry Lewis, Charles Edward Russell), Twentieth Century (George French), and World's Work (C.M. Keys and Q.P.).^[5] Other titles of interest include Chatauquan, Dial, St. Nicholas. In addition, Theodore Roosevelt wrote for Scribner's Magazine after leaving office.

Origin of the term, Theodore Roosevelt[link]

Theodore Roosevelt

Pilgrim's Progress, a first edition

After President Theodore Roosevelt took office in 1901, he began to manage the press corps and to do so he elevated his press secretary to cabinet status and initiated press conferences. The muckraking journalists who emerged around 1900, like the muckraking Lincoln Steffens, were not as easy for Roosevelt to manage as the objective journalists, and the President gave Steffens access to the White House and interviews to steer stories his way.^[15][16]

While he may never have used the term himself, the origin of the "muckraker" is attributed to President Theodore Roosevelt, who, during a speech delivered on April 14, 1906, and on the occasion of dedicating the U.S. House of Representatives office building, drew on a character from John Bunyan’s 1678 classic, Pilgrim’s Progress, saying:

“... you may recall the description of the Man with the Muck-rake, the man who could look no way but downward with the muck-rake in his hands; Who was offered a celestial crown for his muck-rake, but who would neither look up nor regard the crown he was offered, but continued to rake to himself the filth of the floor.”^[17]

There are, in the body politic, economic and social, many and grave evils, and there is urgent necessity for the sternest war upon them. There should be relentless exposure of and attack upon every evil man whether politician or business man, every evil practice, whether in politics, in business, or in social life. I hail as a benefactor every writer or speaker, every man who, on the platform, or in book, magazine, or newspaper, with merciless severity makes such attack, provided always that he in his turn remembers that the attack is of use only if it is absolutely truthful.

—Theodore Roosevelt^[17]

The muckrakers themselves proudly adopted the label.^[18]

The term eventually came to be used in reference to investigative journalists^{[citation needed]} who reported about and exposed issues such as crime, fraud, waste, public health and safety, graft, illegal financial practices. A muckraker's reporting may span businesses and government.

Early 20th century muckraking[link]

Early Writers of the Muckraking Tradition

Ray Stannard Baker  Lincoln Steffens  Ida M Tarbell  Upton Sinclair  Will Irwin  David Graham Phillips  Jacob Riis  Charles Edward Russell  William English Walling

Some of the key documents that came to define the work of the muckrakers were:

Ray Stannard Baker published "The Right to Work" in McClure's Magazine in 1903, about coal mine conditions, a coal strike, and the situation of non-striking workers (or scabs). Many of the non-striking workers had no special training or knowledge in mining, since they were simply farmers looking for work. His investigative work portrayed the dangerous conditions in which these people worked in the mines, and the dangers they faced from union members who did not want them to work.

Lincoln Steffens published “Tweed Days in St. Louis”, in which he profiled corrupt leaders in St. Louis, in October, 1902, in McClure’s Magazine.^[19]

Ida Tarbell published The Rise of the Standard Oil Company in 1902, providing insight into the manipulation of trusts. One trust they manipulated was with Christopher Dunn Co. She followed that work with The History of The Standard Oil Company: the Oil War of 1872, which appeared in McClure's Magazine in 1908.

Upton Sinclair published The Jungle in 1906, which revealed conditions in the meat packing industry in the United States and was a major factor in the establishment of the Pure Food and Drug Act. Sinclair wrote the book with the intent of addressing unsafe working conditions in that industry, not food safety. Sinclair was not a professional journalist but his story was first serialized before being published in book form. Sinclair considered himself to be a muckraker.

" The Treason of the Senate: Aldrich, the Head of it All", by David Graham Phillips, published as a series of articles in Cosmopolitan magazine in February, 1906, described corruption in the U.S. Senate.

The Great American Fraud (1905) by Samuel Hopkins Adams revealed fraudulent claims and endorsements of patent medicines in America. This article shed light on the many false claims that pharmaceutical companies and other manufactures would make as to the potency of their medicines, drugs and tonics. Using the example of Peruna in his article, Adams described how this tonic, which was made of seven compound drugs and alcohol,^[20] did not have “any great potency”.^[20] Manufacturers sold it at an obscene price and hence made immense profits. His work forced a crackdown on a number of other patents and fraudulent schemes of medicinal companies.

Many other works by muckrakers brought to light a variety of issues in America during the Progressive era.^[20] These writers focused on a wide range of issues including the monopoly of Standard Oil; cattle processing and meat packing; patent medicines; child labor; and wages, labor, and working conditions in industry and agriculture. In a number of instances, the revelations of muckraking journalists led to public outcry, governmental and legal investigations, and, in some cases, legislation was enacted to address the issues the writers' identified, such as harmful social conditions; pollution; food and product safety standards; sexual harassment; unfair labor practices; fraud; and other matters. The work of the muckrakers in the early years, and those today, span a wide array of legal, social, ethical and public policy concerns.

Muckrakers and their works[link]

• Samuel Hopkins Adams (1871–1958) — The Great American Fraud (1905), exposed false claims about patent medicines
• Ray Stannard Baker (1870–1946) — of McClure's & The American Magazine
• Burton J. Hendrick (1870–1949) — "The Story of Life Insurance" May - November 1906 McClure's
• Frances Kellor (1873–1952) — studied chronic unemployment in her book Out of Work (1904)
• Thomas William Lawson (1857–1924) Frenzied Finance (1906) on Amalgamated Copper stock scandal
• Gustavus Myers (1872–1942) - documented corruption in his first book "The History of Tammany Hall" (1901) unpublished, Revised edition, Boni and Liveright, 1917. His second book (in three volumes) related a "History of the Great American Fortunes" Chicago: Charles H. Kerr & Co., 1909–1910 ; Single volume Modern Library edition, New York, 1936. Other works include "History of The Supreme Court of the United States" Chicago: Charles H. Kerr & Co., 1912. "A History of Canadian Wealth" Chicago: Charles H. Kerr & Co., 1914. "History of Bigotry in the United States" New York: Random House, 1943 Published posthumously.
• Edwin Markham (1852–1940) - published an exposé of child labor in Children in Bondage (1914)
• Frank Norris (1870–1902) The Octopus
• Mrs. Fremont Older (1856–1935) - wrote on San Francisco corruption and on the case of Tom Mooney
• Jacob Riis (1849–1914) - How the Other Half Lives, the slums
• Charles Edward Russell (1860–1941) — investigated Beef Trust, Georgia's prison
• Upton Sinclair (1878–1968) — The Jungle (1906), U.S. meat-packing industry, and the books in the "Dead Hand" series that critique the institutions (journalism, education, etc.) that could but did not prevent these abuses.
• John Spargo (1876–1966) — American reformer and author, The Bitter Cry of Children (child labor)
• Lincoln Steffens (1866–1936) The Shame of the Cities (1904)
• Ida M. Tarbell (1857–1944) exposé, The History of the Standard Oil Company
• John Kenneth Turner — (1879–1948) author of Barbarous Mexico (1910), an account of the exploitative debt-peonage system used in Mexico under Porfirio Díaz.

Impact[link]

According to Fred J. Cook, the muckrakers' journalism resulted in litigation or legislation that had a lasting impact, such as the end of Standard Oil's monopoly over the oil industry, the establishment of the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, the creation of the first child labor laws in the United States around 1916. Their reports exposed bribery and corruption at the city and state level, as well as in Congress, that led to reforms and changed election results.

"The effect on the soul of the nation was profound. It can hardly be considered an accident that the heyday of the muckrakers coincided with one of America's most yeasty and vigorous periods of ferment. The people of the country were aroused by the corruptions and wrongs of the age -- and it was the muckrakers who informed and aroused them. The results showed in the great wave of progressivism and reform cresting in the remarkable spate of legislation that marked the first administration of Woodrow Wilson from 1913 to 1917. For this, the muckrakers had paved the way."^[7]

Other changes that resulted from muckraker articles include the reorganization of the U.S. Navy (after Henry Reuterdahl published a controversial article in McClure's). Articles like David Graham Phillip's "Treason of the Senate" were used to change the way Senators were elected by the Seventeenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.^{[citation needed]}

Second half of the 20th century[link]

The influence of the early muckrakers continued to inspire journalists and non-journalists alike long after the progressive era had ended. The journalism and long-form works of non-journalists which yielded important news and developments and was done in the spirit of reform during this period include:

• Paul Y. Anderson (August 29, 1893 – December 6, 1938) is best known for his reporting of a race riot and the Teapot Dome scandal.
• Rachel Carson, (May 27, 1907 – April 14, 1964) a marine biologist who became a famous writer, best known for her 1962 book Silent Spring, which confronted the chemical industry and helped to spur legislation for regulation and control of DDT and other industrially and domestically used substances.
• Claud Cockburn (1904–1981) - In Time of Trouble (1956), A Discord of Trumpets
• Jessica Mitford (1917–1996) — British born author of The American Way of Death (US Funeral Industry), Kind and Usual Punishment and Making of a Muckraker (collection on various topics including writing schools)
• Ralph Nader,Unsafe at Any Speed (1965) led to reforms in automotive manufacturing in the United States.
• George Seldes (1890–1995) — Freedom of the Press (1935) and Lords of the Press (1938), blacklisted during the 1950s period of McCarthyism.
• I.F. Stone (1907–1989), known for his writings about McCarthyism and Vietnam War in The Nation and in his own newsletter I. F. Stone's Weekly.
• Casey Swint (1904–1999) - weekly editor of Atlanta Journal Constitution, wrote Keys to the City (non-fiction book about influence of political bosses on Atlanta politics). Early Civil Rights advocate.
• (Louis) Studs Terkel (May 16, 1912 – October 31, 2008) — Chicago writer, journalist, DJ, and oral historian

Contemporary muckrakers[link]

• Ben Bagdikian — (b. 1920, Ottoman Empire) editor, journalist and major American Media Critic, also the dean emeritus of the University of California at Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism; author of The Media Monopoly and The New Media Monopoly
• Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele — longtime investigative reporting team, now with Vanity Fair.
• Wayne Barrett — investigative journalist, senior editor of the Village Voice; wrote on mystique and misdeeds in Rudy Giuliani's conduct as mayor of New York City, Grand Illusion: The Untold Story of Rudy Giuliani and 9/11 (2006)
• Richard Behar — investigative journalist, two-time winner of the 'Jack Anderson Award'. Anderson himself once praised Behar as "one of the most dogged of our watchdogs"
• Chris Hedges — investigative journalist, columnist for Truthdig, Harper's Magazine, author.
• Noam Chomsky (b. 1928) - Prolific author, high-level, observant, circumspect muckraker working within the academic landscape.
• CounterPunch newsletter describing its mission as "muckraking with a radical attitude", published in the United States, edited by, among others, Alexander Cockburn
• Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941) — journalist and author - Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America
• Stuart Goldman — investigative reporter, critic, syndicated columnist.
• Juan Gonzalez — investigative reporter, columnist in New York Daily News
• Amy Goodman (b. 1957) — broadcast journalist, host of Pacifica Radio Network's program Democracy Now!
• David Ray Griffin - theologian, philosopher, author; leading academic critic of federal government's explanation of 9-11 events; author of "9/11 Ten Years Later: When State Crimes Against Democracy Succeed" (2011)
• Beau Hodai (b. 1981) - investigative reporter In These Times, Extra!, exposed American Legislative Exchange Council, Koch Industries influence, for-profit private prison industry, Tea Party movement
• John Howard Griffin (1920–1980) — white journalist who disguised himself as a black man to write about racial injustice in the south
• Seymour Hersh — My Lai massacre, Israeli nuclear weapons program, Henry Kissinger, the Kennedys, 2003 invasion of Iraq, Abu Ghraib abuses
• Malcolm Johnson — exposed organized crime on the New York waterfront
• Jonathan Kwitny (1941–1998) — wrote numerous investigative articles for The Wall Street Journal
• Joshua Micah Marshall - writer and journalist, operates the muckraking blog TPM Muckraker, responsible for helping to break the 2006-2007 US Attorney firing scandal, the Duke Cunningham corruption case and others.
• Stephen Mayne — shareholder-activist and founder of crikey.com.au
• Mark Crispin Miller — professor and writer; has written on 2000 and 2004 contested elections
• Michael Moore — documentary filmmaker, director of Roger & Me, Bowling for Columbine, Fahrenheit 911, and Sicko
• Ralph Nader — consumer rights advocate; Unsafe at Any Speed (1965), exposed unsafe automobile manufacturing
• Allan Nairn — Indonesian slaughter of East Timorese Dili Massacre, US backing of Haitian death squad "Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haïti"
• Jack Newfield — muckraking columnist; wrote for New York Post
• Alexey Navalny — Russian lawyer and blogger, investigating and writing about corruption
• Greg Palast (b. 1952) — politics and elections issues, Exxon Valdez, international corporate crime, corruption, reporter for British Broadcasting Corporation.
• John Pilger (b. 1939) — award-winning war correspondent, film maker and author
• Anna Politkovskaya — murdered Russian journalist critical of the Kremlin
• Jeffrey Robinson - author of The Laundrymen - Inside money laundering, the world's third largest business
• Jeremy Scahill - author of Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, contributor to Democracy Now!
• Eric Schlosser — author of Fast Food Nation, an exposé of fast food in American culture
• Morgan Spurlock — American filmmaker; exposed through example the dangers of McDonalds in his documentary Super Size Me
• Maia Szalavitz - author of Help at Any Cost: How the Troubled-Teen Industry Cons Parents and Hurts Kids, an expose of abuse in the unregulated troubled teen industry and controversy surrounding the methods and philosophy behind tough love behavior modification.
• Matt Taibbi an American author and polemical journalist for Rolling Stone and Men's Journal
• Hunter S. Thompson (1937–2005) — American journalist and author credited with the invention of gonzo journalism
• Günter Wallraff - German journalist who famously makes extensive use of undercover journalism
• Gary Webb (1955–2004) — investigated Contra-crack cocaine connection, published as Dark Alliance (1999)
• Gary Weiss — exposed the Mob on Wall Street, described by Barron's Magazine as "an old-time gumshoe, with a soupçon of little-guy champion Jimmy Breslin and a dash of 1950s bad-boy comic Lenny Bruce"
• Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein — journalists for The Washington Post on the Watergate scandal; authors of All the President's Men, non-fiction account of the scandal
• Adrian Wojnarowski — NBA columnist that has published articles about corruption and secrets of the league.
• Savannah Corralez - College professor that teaches history.

See also[link]

Journalism portal

• History of American newspapers

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Cook, Fred J. (1972). The Muckrakers. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Co.
• Gallagher, Aileen (2006). The Muckrakers, American Journalism During the Age of Reform. New York: The Rosen Publishing Group.
• Regier, C. C. (1957). The Era of the Muckrakers. Gloucester, Mass.: Peter Smith.
• Swados, Harvey (Ed). (1962). Years of Conscience: The Muckrakers. Cleveland: World Publishing Co.
• Weinberg, Arthur and Lila (Eds). (1964). The Muckrakers: The Era in Journalism that Moved America to Reform, the Most Significant Magazine Articles of 1902–1912. New York: Capricon Books.
• Wilson, Harold S. (1970). McClure's Magazine and the Muckrakers. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. ISBN 069104600X.

External links[link]

• The Wiktionary entry for muckraker
• Original Nellie Bly articles at Nellie Bly Online

Rocket From the Tombs (or RFTT) is an American rock music band originally active from mid-1974 to mid-1975 in Cleveland, Ohio.

Heralded as an important protopunk group, they were little known during their lifetime, though various members later achieved renown in Pere Ubu and the Dead Boys. Billy Bob Hargus wrote, however, that "The sound of the Rockets is much more ferocious than Ubu or the Dead Boys." ^[1]

Band history[link]

In 1974, the original line-up included Chris Cuda, Peter Laughner, and Glen "Thunderhand" Hach sharing guitar duties; Charlie Weiner on bass and other implements; and Tom Foolery (née Clements) on drums.

There was some fluctuation of the group's personnel, but the classic lineup included David Thomas (then known as "Crocus Behemoth"^[2]), Peter Laughner, Craig Bell, Gene O'Connor (a.k.a. Cheetah Chrome), and Johnny Madansky (presently known as "Johnny Blitz").

When RFTT disbanded, the personnel split and formed two different musical groups:

• O'Connor and Madansky joined with singer Stiv Bators (who made a guest appearance on-stage at the last RFTT show) to form Frankenstein, which later morphed into the Dead Boys, a more straightforward punk rock group.
• Laughner and Thomas went on to form the more experimental Pere Ubu with bassist Tim Wright (RFTT's soundman). Laughner died in 1977, of acute pancreatitis brought on by years of drinking and drugging.^[3]

Both groups used songs first written or performed by Rocket From The Tombs as parts of their repertoires: the Dead Boys were known for "Ain't It Fun," "What Love Is," "Down in Flames," "Caught With the Meat in Your Mouth" (done by RFTT as "I'm Never Gonna Kill Myself Again") and "Sonic Reducer"; Pere Ubu went on to reinterpret "Final Solution," "Life Stinks" and "30 Seconds Over Tokyo."

Rocket From The Tombs never recorded an album in their lifetime, but various live recordings and demos circulated occasionally as bootlegs. Most of these were collected on a single CD by Smog Veil records, and titled The Day the Earth Met the Rocket from the Tombs (2002).

Reunion[link]

The Smog Veil Records CD rekindled interest in Rocket From The Tombs, and they reformed in 2003 with original members Thomas, Chrome, and Bell, joined by Richard Lloyd (guitar), and Steve Mehlman (drums). Some claim that decades earlier, when Lloyd briefly quit the New York-based band Television, Laughner was seriously considered as his replacement. However, on his website richardlloyd.com, Richard Lloyd asserts that Laughner "was never even close to being in Television, unless I was way out of town for a month, and I don't think so."^[4]

On June 10, 2003 they played their first live radio concert since the 1970s (when two shows live from the Agora club aired on WMMS) on Brian Turner's program on WFMU.^[5]

In 2004, Smog Veil and Morphius released Rocket Redux, consisting of Rocket From The Tombs originals performed in studio by the 2003 lineup. It received mostly positive reviews; one critic declared that Redux "never sounds like a complacent reunion record, and in a way, I suppose it's not really a reunion record in the first place so much as it's a debut album, played with all the hunger and fire of a band eager to make their mark on the world."^[6]

In 2006, Thomas announced that the band had again reunited, this time to work on new material. The band toured the US in the summer of 2006 and debuted some new songs, but no further activity occurred until 2009 when the band contributed a song to the Mark Mulcahy tribute album Ciao My Shining Star. An album of new material, Barfly was released on September 13, 2011 with a tour scheduled to begin in November 2011. However, Richard Lloyd was replaced in the band prior to the tour's launch, and Cheetah Chrome announced his departure from Rocket From the Tombs on December 30, 2011, leaving David Thomas and Craig Bell as the only remaining original members.

Discography[link]

• The Day the Earth Met the Rocket from the Tombs (2002)
• Rocket Redux (2004)
• 'I Sell Soul' / 'Romeo & Juliet' single (6 April 2010)
• "Barfly" (2011) ^[7]

External links[link]

• Rocket From The Tombs Official website
• Ain't It Fun: Rocket From The Tombs, by Billy Bob Hargus
• Review of The Day the Earth Met the... Rocket From the Tombs/Rocket Redux, Crawdaddy!, January 16, 2008.
• Tomb Raider: Before Pere Ubu, before the Dead Boys, there was Cleveland's Rocket From the Tombs

References[link]

• Clinton Heylin, From the Velvets to the Voidoids: A Pre-Punk History for a Post-Punk World (1993), Penguin Books, ISBN 0-14-017970-4

Wayne Barrett

Wayne Barrett is an American journalist. He was^[1] an investigative reporter and senior editor for the Village Voice for over 20 years. He is currently a fellow with the Nation Institute and contributor to Newsweek.

He is the author of many articles and books about politicians, especially New York City figures such as Ed Koch, Donald Trump, and Rudy Giuliani. He is a major interviewee in Kevin Keating's 2006 documentary Giuliani Time. He is also on the adjunct faculty of the Columbia Journalism School.^[2]

References[link]

Selected bibliography[link]

• The Big Apple: City for Sale: Ed Koch and the Betrayal of New York (Harper and Row, 1988, ISBN 0-06-091662-1) (with Jack Newfield)
• Trump: The Deals and the Downfall (Harper Collins, 1992, ISBN 0-06-016704-1)
• Rudy!: An Investigative Biography of Rudolph Giuliani (Basic Books, 2001, ISBN 0-465-00524-1)
• Grand Illusion: The Untold Story of Rudy Giuliani and 9/11 (Harper Collins, 2006, ISBN 0-06-053660-8; with Dan Collins)

External links[link]

• The Real Rudy: From the September print issue: The image of Rudy Giuliani as the hero of September 11 has never been seriously challenged. That changes now, The American Prospect online September 11, 2006
• "Rudy Giuliani's 5 Big Lies About 9/11: On the Stump, Rudy Can't Help Spreading Smoke and Ashes About His Dubious Record", Village Voice, August 8-14, 2007, pp. 22-36.
• "Rudy's Ties to a Terror Sheikh: Giuliani's business contracts tie him to the man who let 9/11's mastermind escape the FBI", Village Voice, November 27, 2007
• Wayne Barrett Laid Off from Village Voice - video report by Democracy Now!

David Shuster
Born	(1967-07-22) July 22, 1967 (age 44) Bloomington, Indiana
Nationality	American
Religion	Jewish[1]
Spouse	Julianna Goldman (separated)
Awards	Disabled American Veterans, Bugle Award (2006) Emmy (1996)

David Martin Shuster (born July 22, 1967) is an American television journalist who has been an anchor for MSNBC and who has also worked for Fox News and CNN. He anchored MSNBC Live weekdays from 10-11am and 3-4pm ET and filled in for Keith Olbermann, Chris Matthews, Ed Schultz and Rachel Maddow on their respective shows. Shuster was MSNBC's lead "breaking news anchor," and anchored prime time coverage of several stories including the death of Michael Jackson, congressional votes for health care reform, and the earthquake in Haiti. Shuster's high profile career has included some controversies; the most recent, an indefinite suspension on April 6, 2010, came from MSNBC after he auditioned for a new political show on CNN. He did not appear on MSNBC again, as his contract expired while serving his suspension. On June 6, 2011, it was confirmed that Shuster was hired by Keith Olbermann and Current TV to serve as "primary substitute anchor" for the network's re-launch of Countdown with Keith Olbermann.

Personal life[link]

Shuster was born in Bloomington, Indiana. He is the son of Arnold Shuster of Bloomington and Susan Klein of Nashville, Indiana, and stepson of Robert Agranoff, married to his mother, and Rose Mahern-Shuster, married to his father; he has one brother, Jonathan. As a child, he was part of the Zionist Youth Leadership Training movement Young Judaea. He graduated in 1985 from Bloomington High School South, and with honors from the University of Michigan. He is in the process of completing a Master of Arts degree in International Affairs at Georgetown University. He was married on May 27, 2007 (at age 39) to journalist Julianna Lee Goldman, at the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue, in Washington, D.C..^[2][3] On January 10, 2011, the Washington Post published a report that Goldman and Shuster had separated.^[4] The couple had no children.^[4]

Career[link]

Early career[link]

Shuster started his journalism career at CNN's Washington, D.C. bureau. He was an assignment editor and field producer from 1990 to 1994, covering both the Persian Gulf War and the 1992 presidential election campaign. Shuster left CNN in 1994 to become a political reporter for the ABC affiliate KATV in Little Rock, Arkansas, covering the Whitewater scandal. During this period, Shuster led KATV's coverage of the indictment, trial, conviction, and resignation of Arkansas Governor Jim Guy Tucker. At KATV, Shuster won a regional Emmy Award for investigative journalism for his reporting on a manufactured housing scandal.

Fox News[link]

From 1996 to 2002, Shuster was a Washington, D.C.-based correspondent for the Fox News Channel. He was at the Pentagon at the time of the September 11, 2001 attacks and led Fox's coverage of U.S. military operations in Afghanistan. During the Clinton Administration, Shuster led Fox's coverage of the Clinton investigations including Whitewater, the Monica Lewinsky scandal, the Starr Report and the Senate impeachment trial.

Shuster was also a member of Fox's "You Decide 2000" political team. He spent four months on John McCain's "Straight Talk Express" bus and was Fox's lead correspondent for McCain's presidential campaign.

MSNBC[link]

Shuster left Fox News for MSNBC/NBC in 2002. In early 2003, he traveled to Qatar, where he provided coverage from the United States Central Command during Operation Iraqi Freedom for hourly live reports in prime time. Later, he was in California for two months for MSNBC's television program Hardball with Chris Matthews as lead correspondent on the 2003 California recall election, in which Governor Gray Davis was recalled and actor Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected. In 2004 he led the show's coverage of the presidential campaign, including leading the "ad watch team," which analyzed 150 campaign ads. In all, he has filed more than 700 correspondent reports for the show.

Occasionally, Shuster filled in for Chris Matthews on Hardball. Recently, he interviewed former President Jimmy Carter on the show. During the trial relating to the Plame affair, Shuster blogged for Hardball on Hardblogger about the Lewis "Scooter" Libby trial and about other political matters. In addition to this, Shuster has also filled in for commentator Keith Olbermann on Countdown.

In August 2005, Shuster reported from the eye of Hurricane Katrina as it made landfall in Biloxi, Mississippi; Shuster’s reports aired on MSNBC and NBC Nightly News. Shuster also spent several weeks reporting on the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina from New Orleans.

On September 24, 2007, Shuster interviewed Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn while filling in on Tucker Carlson's show. When Shuster asked about her response to the MoveOn.org ad campaign concerning General David Petraeus's Iraq war testimony, he followed up by then asking her the name of the last soldier from her congressional district who had been killed in Iraq; she was not able to name the soldier. Shuster mentioned that it was 18-year-old Jeremy Bohannon, and asked Blackburn why she was not able to recall the name. Blackburn's office soon claimed that Bohannon was not actually from Blackburn's congressional district, but was from the congressional district of Rep. John Tanner. However, while Bohannon did grow up in Tanner's district, his legal residence for the year prior to his enlistment was in Blackburn's district. After the promotion of David Gregory to Meet the Press, Shuster was named interim host of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue before being announced as the permanent host.^[5]

Chelsea Clinton remark and suspension[link]

On February 7, 2008, while he was guest-hosting on Tucker, Shuster discussed Chelsea Clinton's campaigning for her mother Hillary Clinton, her efforts to influence superdelegates and her refusal to answer any questions by the media. When his guest, Bill Press, pointed out that Bush's daughters campaigned for their father, Shuster noted the different access rules in each case and responded, "There's just something a little bit unseemly to me that Chelsea's out there calling up celebrities, saying support my mom... doesn't it seem like Chelsea's sort of being pimped out in some weird sort of way?"

The Clinton campaign demanded an apology and stated that Clinton might not participate in any further debates on MSNBC.^[6] Shuster was temporarily suspended from all NBC News and MSNBC appearances for his comments.^[7] Before the suspension, Shuster had engaged in a heated e-mail exchange with a Clinton staffer in which he defended his remarks.^[8] Shuster's two-week suspension^[9] from on-air duties ended on February 22, 2008.^[10]

Indefinite suspension from MSNBC[link]

On April 6, 2010, MSNBC announced that it had suspended David Shuster for an "indefinite period" after they learned from press reports that Shuster and Michel Martin of National Public Radio had shot a pilot episode for a new show on CNN, without the knowledge or permission of MSNBC.^[11][12]

Current TV[link]

Starting July 29, 2011, David Shuster became a regular guest-host of Countdown with Keith Olbermann on Current TV.

Internet venture[link]

Shuster announced in February 2011 that he is seeking to launch a website for investigative journalism.^[13]

Awards[link]

Shuster won an Emmy Award as well as a Bugle Award awarded in August 2006 by the Disabled American Veterans for his coverage of the 2005 National Disabled Veterans Sports Clinic and the hour-long special that accompanied it on MSNBC.

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: David Shuster

• David Shuster at the Internet Movie Database
• David Shuster on Twitter