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 | | Boss-busters and Sin Hounds: Kansas City and Its Star by Harry Haskell ISBN-10: 9780826217691 ISBN-10: 0-8262-1769-9 ISBN-13: 9780826217691 ISBN-13: 978-0-8262-1769-1 Hardcover 2007-10-05 University of Missouri Press Find Lowest Price |
Editorials | ||
Product Description At the turn of the twentieth century, the Kansas City Star was a trust-busting newspaper acclaimed for its progressive spirit; fifty years later it was a busted trust, targeted in the most important antitrust action ever brought against an American daily. Haskell takes readers into the Star s city room and executive offices and tells the story of the three men with contrasting personalities and agendas who shaped the paper: William Rockhill Nelson, among the last of the great personal editors from journalism s golden age; the scholarly Henry J. Haskell, who led the Star to its peak of influence in the 1930s and 40s; and Roy A. Roberts, who went on to combine the roles of newspaper publisher and political kingmaker. Haskell recounts such milestones as the Star s role in the City Beautiful movement that helped transform America s urban centers, the nation s entry into two global wars, a bold but ill-starred experiment in employee ownership, and the paper s battle with Boss Pendergast s legendary political machine. | ||
Reviews | ||
A wonderfully well-written history Though BOSS-BUSTERS is a first-rate piece of scholarship, the most striking aspect of the book is the quality of the writing. The story of Kansas City and its Star is told by Harry Haskell in a supremely readable prose style that allows the fascinating characters who are the actors in this drama to live in the imagination of the reader. Kansas City in the 1880s was a town with dirt streets and an outlaw mentality; from this mean beginning arose the City Beautiful, a great and influential newspaper, and a host of individuals whose lives altered the course of the twentieth century. Though sympathetic, Harry Haskell's portrait of his grandfather, Henry J. Haskell (the Pulitzer-prize winning editor of the Star), is informed by a remarkable objectivity. BOSS-BUSTERS is a splendid piece of writing on political and social history, the history of journalism and, ultimately, on the human character. | ||
Extraordinary Journey Haskell's meticulously researched account of the history of The Kansas City Star is a brilliant journey through history. Not only does this work describe the political and social passions and conflicts of America from the late 19th century to the present, it sheds light upon the humanity and foibles of such players as Theodore Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and numerous civic and national figures. It shows how the powerful forces of a newspaper and its founder, William Rockhill Nelson, could alter the course of a young city's growth, as well as influence an entire nation. Haskell is to be commended for this very readable, scholarly addition to American social, political, and economic history. | ||
Haskell's readable tribute First and foremost this is a first -rate read that is meticulously researched. A recall of the days when KANSAS CITY and ITS STAR were a vibrant center of the United States and print journalism not only reported the news but often made it. A time before corporate media and newspaper chains were the name of the game in one newspaper towns, when bright energetic men with little money and brash bravado could set up shop and produce a paper and maybe make a lotta money. One such man was William Rockhill Nelson . This is his story and how he done it pushing the boosterism that both endorsed and transformed the booming cowtown on the bend of the Missouri River into the CITY BEAUTIFUL. He also became a big-time player on the national scene . Fun to read as he plays politics loving the intrigue and being buddy-buddy with the likes of Teddy Roosevelt. And he made more than a pot of money. Well those not so halcyon days am gone. Print journalism is on the run. The Kansas City Star is part of the McClatchy Company which if you hafta be part of a chain is, I suppose, as good as it can get. Nelson's real legacy is the Nelson-Atkins Gallery of Art built on the grounds of his estate and housing a major collection of Chinese art. | ||
Title Undersells Book Comments written by: Dr. E. Grey Dimond Kansas City, Missouri December 10, 2007 This is an excellent book for someone who has been deep enough into Kansas City to have a "feel" for its politics, its Establishment, the dynamics of this town at the river's bend. Here is where the Missouri River suddenly turns east, crosses the width of the State, to reach the Mississippi River at St. Louis. To fully be "filled in" on these basics of this community, the recent book about the Establishment of Kansas City should be, would be, the right beginning. Even then, one should have lived here, read its newspaper the Kansas City Star, and participated, even marginally, in the who's who--what makes it tick arena. I speak not of myself but of the author. Haskell is the grandson of one of the do-ers, leaders that shaped the newspaper and the community and for several years was on the Star's staff. As a comment not needed but meant as a compliment: the title under-sells the book. Perhaps it will help sales but Haskell has produced so much more than this 'reach for eye-catching' label suggests. This is a book about the life of the Kansas City Star from its founding to that point that it sold its ownership away to distant buyers who never knew the town, who lost the boldness, activism, guts that made the paper and certainly helped make the city. I have lived here in both eras and each day's newspaper is a reminder of the loss. The book is the story of William Rockhill Nelson, J.C. Nichols, Tom Pendergast, Senator Reed (Nelly Don's husband), Roy Roberts, Henry J. Haskell and the Kansas City of the 1980s through the FDR era. For me, it is a reminder of efforts, good and bad, of the founders of local fortunes to secure it for their heirs: comparing Nelson to Nichols to Joyce Hall. | ||
A must read Kansas City was known as a "cow town" in Canada. By delving into the history of Kansas City and the impressive dominance and power of its newspaper, The Kansas City Star, Mr. Haskell's easily read book has shown me that this Mid-Western city was anything but a lowly "cow town." It was involved with highly important events at home, as well as abroad. Helen Keller, Ernest Hemingway, Sinclair Lewis, Katharine Wright (sister of Orville and Wilbur Wright), Presidents Theodore Roosevelt, FDR, Herbert Hoover, Dwight Eisenhower, and Harry Truman are well-known names associated with Kansas City. However, William Rockhill Nelson, Roy Roberts and Henry Joseph Haskell were vastly influential socially and politically throughout many sectors of the United States. There is a wealth of fascinating information in Boss-Busters and Sin Hounds that will appeal to the general public. | ||