Tuesday, January 8, 2008

BEFORE OUR HEADS WERE SWELLED

Once upon a time, journalists understood that they weren't ncessarily more important than the news they covered. Consider Henry Hamilton Fyfe (1869-1951), the leading British correspondent of World War I, who wrote for Alfred Harmsworth's Daily Mirror. He even turned down a knighthood, considering it a bribe to keep him from writing about the inefficiency and corruption he'd witnessed during the war.


I love this response he sent to an autograph-seeker: "I am afraid you have mistaken me for a 'celebrity.' I am only a hard-working journalist." Hear, hear!



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