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Froth and Scum - Truth, Beauty, Goodness, and the Ax Murder in America's First Mass Medium (Paperback, New edition)
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Froth and Scum - Truth, Beauty, Goodness, and the Ax Murder in America's First Mass Medium (Paperback, New edition)
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Two notorious antebellum New York murder cases--a prostitute
slashed in an elegant brothel and a tradesman bludgeoned by the
brother of inventor Samuel Colt--set off journalistic scrambles
over the meanings of truth, objectivity, and the duty of the press
that reverberate to this day. In 1833 an entirely new kind of
newspaper--cheap, feisty, and politically independent--introduced
American readers to the novel concept of what has come to be called
objectivity in news coverage. The penny press was the first medium
that claimed to present the true, unbiased facts to a democratic
audience. But in "Froth and Scum," Andie Tucher explores--and
explodes--the notion that 'objective' reporting will discover a
single, definitive truth. As they do now, news stories of the time
aroused strong feelings about the possibility of justice, the
privileges of power, and the nature of evil. The prostitute's
murder in 1836 sparked an impassioned public debate, but one
newspaper's 'impartial investigation' pleased the powerful by
helping the killer go free. Colt's 1841 murder of the tradesman
inspired universal condemnation, but the newspapers' singleminded
focus on his conviction allowed another secret criminal to escape.
By examining media coverage of these two sensational murders,
Tucher reveals how a community's needs and anxieties can shape its
public truths. The manuscript of this book won the 1991 Allan
Nevins Prize of the Society of American Historians for the
best-written dissertation in American history. from the book
Journalism is important. It catches events on the cusp between now
and then--events that still may be changing, developing, ripening.
And while new interpretations of the past can alter our
understanding of lives once led, new interpretations of the present
can alter the course of our lives as we live them. Understanding
the news properly is important. The way a community receives the
news is profoundly influenced by who its members are, what they
hope and fear and wish, and how they think about their fellow
citizens. It is informed by some of the most occult and abstract of
human ideas, about truth, beauty, goodness, and justice.
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