America's Last Great Newspaper War
The Death of Print in a Two-Tabloid Town
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ALSO AVAILABLE AS AN AUDIOBOOK
A from-the-trenches view of New York Daily News and New York Post runners and photographers as they stop at nothing to break the story and squash their tabloid arch-rivals.
When author Mike Jaccarino was offered a job at the Daily News in 2006, he was asked a single question: “Kid, what are you going to do to help us beat the Post?” That was the year things went sideways at the News, when the New York Post surpassed its nemesis in circulation for the first time in the history of both papers. Tasked with one job—crush the Post—Jaccarino here provides the behind-the-scenes story of how the runners and shooters on both sides would do anything and everything to get the scoop before their opponents.
The New York Daily News and the New York Post have long been the Hatfields and McCoys of American media: two warring tabloids in a town big enough for only one of them. As digital news rendered print journalism obsolete, the fight to survive in NYC became an epic, Darwinian battle. In America’s Last Great Newspaper War, Jaccarino exposes the untold story of this tabloid death match of such ferocity and obsession its like has not occurred since Pulitzer– Hearst.
Told through the eyes of hungry “runners” (field reporters) and “shooters” (photographers) who would employ phony police lights to overcome traffic, Mike Jaccarino’s memoir unmasks the do-whatever-it-takes era of reporting—where the ends justified the means and nothing was off-limits. His no-holds-barred account describes sneaking into hospitals, months-long stakeouts, infiltrating John Gotti’s crypt, bidding wars for scoops, high-speed car chases with Hillary Clinton, O.J. Simpson, and the baby mama of a philandering congressman—all to get that coveted front-page story.
Today, few runners and shooters remain on the street. Their age and exploits are as bygone as the News–Post war and American newspapers, generally. Where armies once battled, often no one is covering the story at all.
Funding for this book was provided by: Furthermore: a program of the J. M. Kaplan Fund
The circulation battle between the New York Daily News and the New York Post—the Hatfields and the McCoys of American media—was an epic tabloid fight, waged as digital media was on the rise and print on the decline. Jaccarino’s book is a lively, no-holds-barred account of a fight where staffers stopped at nothing to beat their rivals.
Mike Jaccarino delivers a street-level view of the ultimately unwinnable tabloid war between the Daily News and the New York Post. A richly detailed account from a reporter who was born to run.---Larry McShane, Daily News
The book is called America’s Last Great Newspaper War. In it, Mike Jaccarino shows himself to be a first-rate war correspondent. He does what reporters are supposed to do: Gets the story right.---Mike Lupica, bestselling author of Million-Dollar Throw
This one’s for all the newbies who will never run, shoot or duck and dive. This one’s for all the vets who cared less about the dough than about the run, shoot, duck and dive. This one’s for everyone who thinks that 'news' means TV talking heads with hairspray and prepared scripts, or those who don flak jackets to report from the outskirts of disaster. This one’s for everyone who ever uttered the words, 'fake news.' Mike Jaccarino’s tale of the tabloids is the real deal and should be required reading not just for every journalism student but every news junkie who never got what it took—and what it still takes—to get that great 'get.' A wondrous read.---Linda Stasi, New York Daily News columnist/reporter, bestselling author, The Sixth Station, Book of Judas
"America's Last Great Newspaper War is a cinematic, action-packed closeup of the last of the great New York street reporters and photographers from the Daily News and Post as they chase down blackmailed beauty queens, cheating athletes, disgraced pols, scamming financiers and murderers on the lam—all while fighting their own tabloid death match. Mike Jaccarino paints them as part private detectives, part Special Ops but with only one holy passion—getting the get. He proves, here, the story behind the headlines is actually the best one of them all.---Joanna Molloy, author of The Greatest Beer Run Ever
In his debut book, former Daily News reporter Jaccarino effectively evokes a bygone era, focusing on the pugnacious personalities behind both papers, from the 1980s through the 2000s, as print journalism suffered significant entropy... These tales of tense stakeouts, murders, and various scandals have a pungent authenticity.
This book isn't just hella fun to read, but it is also an incisive, thorough, meticulously documented & superbly written account of life on NYC streets for the papers that covered daily news at a time of unprecedented change & upheaval in the industry. Excellent work.---Aaron Showalter, journalist
Jaccarino, a writer with a vibrant, zingy style, presents the nitty gritty of tabloid journalism from the front lines, speeding down expressways, racing to the scenes of murder, fire and general mayhem. A typical chapter in Newspaper War is like a strong cup of coffee.
Prologue: “Shell Shock for News Nuts” | 1
1 “Serb Thug to New York . . . Kiss My Ash” | 5
2 “All Play, No Pay for Page Fix” | 16
3 “Ford to City: Drop Dead” | 39
4 “Cops Shoot Groom Dead” | 51
5 “N.J. Miss in a Fix Over Her Pics!” | 62
6 “2 Cops Shot During Traffic Stop” | 92
7 “Tracked Down and Busted in Pa. Woods” | 113
8 “Sports’ Worst Nightmare” | 123
9 “‘Mayday’ Last Call from Doomed Bravest at Ground Zero” | 143
10 “The Juice Is on the Loose: O.J. Simpson Leaves Jail
after Posting $125,000 Bail” | 162
11 “Preppie Killer Robert Chambers Acts Like a ‘Dumb’ Doper” | 191
12 “Legend of Jim Leyritz’s Swing against Braves
Spoiled by His Swigs” | 198
13 “If Spitzer Really Wore Socks in Bed, May Mean
Fear of Intimacy: Sex Experts” | 234
14 “Ma Goes to Bat for Derek Jeter” | 253
15 “What to Tell Kids When Daddy Has Two Families” | 262
16 “Temple of Doom . . . Madoff Fleeced Fifth
Avenue Synagogue” | 283
Glossary | 291
Notes | 293
Index | 299
Photographs follow page 152
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