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Book 1 Vanished Times
1 Grains of Truth 3
2 Getting Up Steam 12
3 First, Know Your Enemy 40
4 Hot Metal 72
5 How I Won the War 100
6 Non Nobis Solum 112
7 The Sting of Disraeli's Gibe 122
8 Stop Press 138
9 Why Aren't Their Women Wearing Our Frocks? 166
10 Adventures in the Land of Opportunity 192
11 From Delhi to Darlington 235
12 Just Causes 263
Book 2 Scoop, Scandal, and Strife
13 The Rolls-Royce of Fleet Street 301
14 The Third Man 323
15 Children on Our Conscience 353
16 Space Barons 385
17 Death in Cairo 413
18 Divided Loyalties 445
19 Showdowns 482
20 My Newfoundland 507
Acknowledgments 545
Principal Sunday Times Books 553
Bibliography 557
Index 565
Though this book is almost 600 pages long it is a fast read. Thats because Mr. Evans has a very light and fun way of writting. I really enjoyed his discriptions of the old way of gathering news and how much work went into publishing a newspaper. And some of the ground breaking reporting he did is amazing. All in all a very good book.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Harold Evans' My Paper Chase: True Stories of Vanished Times appears a bit intimidating at first, if only because of the breadth, depth, and heft of it. But Harold Evans' writing flows, I found myself thoroughly engrossed. Born in 1928 from working class parents, Evans became a reporter at sixteen. His natural ability, drive, tenacity, and nose for a good story led him not just to excel in his field but to take on unrecognized and unpopular causes and to sway public opinion. One of the book's greatest strengths is the extent to which Evans gives us the background and context for each of the events or stories that he shares.
At the start, Evans delves into his own background. His father had little formal education but was a genius at numbers. For instance, if you named a date whether it was 25 years ago or just a few months, his father could unerringly identify which day of the week it was. He worked his way up at the railway, beginning as an engine cleaner to the position of driver. His ability to calculate how much a person's wages would be, taking into account the different wage scales, overtime, deductions, and irregular hours, was recognized in his company's accounting staff and won him the gratitude and affection of his colleagues at the railway. Evans points out that in England at that time, his father's mathematical abilities, even coupled with hard work, would not have afforded him better opportunities because of "the Geddes axe." Sir Eric Geddes, a.k.a. Lord Inchcape, a Minister of the Crown and the former manager of the North Eastern Railway Company, had a strong contempt for the abilities of the working class. In his committee's examination of the expenditure of public funds, he advised against giving secondary school education to poor children, "children whose mental capabilities do not justify it" - essentially consigning an entire generation to very limited prospects.
Evans' generation were given the opportunity to advance through a limited number of scholarships granted to ex-servicemen by the Ministry of Education, through the Butler Education Act in Great Britain. The Butler Act was a more restrictive version of the G.I. Bill but it paid for Evans' university education.
Evans shares what it was like to work in the early newsrooms, where typewriters, typesetters, scissors, spikes, and paste were critical tools of the trade. In the chapter Stop Press, Evans shares what it was like as a young "copy taster" managing the coverage of the unfolding of the Harrow-Wealdstone disaster - a train crash that quickly became a collision of three trains with 75 dead and 110 feared dead for Manchester Evening News. He managed, edited, revised, and published eight editions in six hours, without the help of computers.
Evans' projects range from battling air pollution to helping improve overseas newspapers, to beautifying Manchester to exposing the cause of the deadliest DC-10 air crash and uncovering one of the largest health scandals in the century.
I found it fascinating - it's a book that I'll enjoy rereading at leisure.
Review copy provided by the publisher.
I'm a huge fan of memoirs. I love to read about someone else's life. My Paper Chase tells the story of Howard Evans who ran a newspaper and the struggles he faced daily. He charged on even when there was a chance that the newspaper would lose it's place in the world.
This was a very interesting book that allows you to look back in time and understand that nothing comes easy and everything has a price.
Anonymous
Posted November 12, 2009
This is a compelling read. Mr. Evans writes with passion about his love for newspapers, his yearning for education, the responsibilities of journalism. You can practically smell the newsprint as an edition is coming off the presses. I gained a new understanding of the role of investigative journalism and the challenges reporters and editors face. I could not put this book down.
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Overview
In My Paper Chase, Harold Evans recounts the wild and wonderful tale of newspapering life. His story stretches from the 1930s to his service in WWII, through towns big and off the map. He discusses his passion for the crusading style of reportage he championed, his clashes with Rupert Murdoch, and his struggle to use journalism to better the lives of those less fortunate. There's a star-studded cast and a tremendously vivid sense of what once was: the lead type, the smell of the presses, eccentrics throughout, and angry editors screaming over the intercoms. My Paper Chase tells the story of Evans's great loves: newspapers and Tina Brown, the bright, ...