Shaking the Foundations

Bruce Shapiro and Pete Hamill
September 2003     ISBN: 1560254335

The ink had barely dried on the First Amendment when American journalists invented an unprecedented tradition of inquiry and expose. Shaking the Foundations is the first book to bring together the writing of two centuries of reporters who brought down Presidents and corporations, challenged the logic of wars and freed the innocent. Shaking the Foundations chronicles the great debates of American history: Jim Crow and financial trusts, migrant labor and environmental destruction, witch hunts and government corruption. As journalism, these unabridged dispatches--many never before available in book form--offer inspiration for today's muckrakers, combining the thrill of the chase with a burning sense of outrage. For the general reader, Shaking the Foundations presents compelling true-life tales of scandal, cover-up and murder, and of reporters who tenaciously fought for the truth. Shaking the Foundations establishes investigative journalism as an essential force in American politics and the history of our democracy.

Contributors include: Henry Adams on the Erie Railroad, Nelly Bly on the New York Insane Asylum, Rachel Carson on pesticides, Vera Connelly on Native American reservations, Marvel Cooke on the Bronx Slave Market, Mark Dowie and Barbara Ehrenreich on the corporate crime of the century, Stetson Kennedy on the Ku Klux Klan, Jonathan Kwitney on the mafia.

"Arriving shortly after the New York Times's fall from grace at the hands of a fraudulent staff reporter, this collection of America's best investigative reporting may redeem not only that paper but the entire profession of journalism.... It's been said that journalism is the first draft of history--if so, then this is a history of the writing of history."

--Publishers Weekly

"[A] well-made anthology of writings by muckrakers both eminent and unknown....Nation contributing editor Shapiro here assembles a fine sampler of writings that take on that ubiquitous, persistent enemy; just as he notes that the term 'investigative journalism' defies easy definition, he offers excerpts that range from death-defying reportage to easy-chair punditry.... Shapiro's editorial judgment is sound throughout, and his commentary on the texts will prove useful to readers without much background in the dig-and-disturb tradition of reporting. A welcome addition to any journalist's library, and an inspiring read for rising Woodward-Bernsteins."

--Kirkus Reviews

"[A] superb anthology... Even chronic media haters who pay attention to the selections in this anthology would have to concede this: Investigative reporters have played a significant role throughout the American democratic experiment."

--Seattle Times

Bruce Shapiro is a contributing editor of The Nation and co-author of Legal Lynching: The Death Penalty and America's Future, with Rev. Jesse Jackson and Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. He teaches investigative journalism at Yale University and is field director of the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma.

Pete Hamill has worked as a columnist for the New York Post, the New York Daily News and Newsday and his work has appeared in many other publications, including Esquire and New York magazine. He is the recipient of many journalistic awards and the author of the best-selling Snow in August, A Drinking Life and Forever.