Friday, November 03, 2006
By Carl Hoover
Tribune-Herald entertainment editor
Five million dollars and two feet of letters signal much of what author Alicia C. Shepard found in researching her new book, Woodward & Bernstein: Life in the Shadow of Watergate.
The $5 million was what the University of Texas at Austin paid journalists Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein for the papers and notes they amassed during their ground-breaking investigation of the Watergate scandal in 1972-74, a sum she says indicates the place the two Washington Post reporters hold in journalism history.
The two feet of letters, a fraction of the 40 feet that the archive’s papers, letters, clippings and magazines take up, demonstrate the popularity the two reporters had in the public’s eye, particularly after the 1976 film All the President’s Men.
“People just thought they were superheroes,” said Shepard, speaking by phone from Austin. “The Washington Post had to hire a personal assistant to handle their mail, there was so much of it, and they were still Metro reporters.”
Shepard, 53, stops at Waco’s Barnes & Noble Booksellers from 1 to 5 p.m. Saturday to sign copies of her book.
The book evolved from a 2003 piece she wrote for Washingtonian magazine. Incidentally, Shepard, a writer and American University journalism professor, was one of the first researchers to get access to the newly acquired UT archive.
While the amount of personal mail the two reporters received surprised her, she came across equally fascinating material in her research, including All the President’s Men director Alan Pakula’s interviews of the journalists and their editors.
While some might believe the two reporters still in their 20s brought down President Richard Nixon, who resigned Aug. 9, 1974, because of the scandal and its coverup, that’s just not so, Shepard said. The courts, the FBI, the secret tapes of internal White House discussions, Senate hearings — all played key parts in unraveling the Nixon administration’s involvement in bugging Democratic headquarters and its subsequent coverup.
The difference? Woodward and Bernstein had a major motion picture made from their book All the President’s Men, one with film stars Dustin Hoffman (Bernstein) and Robert Redford (Woodward). While the movie got many things right, it made viewers believe the two were plucky Davids who defeated a governmental Goliath, she said.
In reality, the two were young reporters with dissimilar personalities. Woodward had less than nine months at the Post under his belt when he started on the story, Bernstein 12 years. “They formed like a super-reporter: Woodward was very focused and disciplined, Bernstein had raw talent and a lot of energy. One of his editors called him ‘brilliant — in spurts,’ ” she noted.
Still close friends, they took divergent career paths after Watergate. Woodward became an investigative insider, reporting on the workings of the Supreme Court, the Reagan administration and the current Bush administration. Bernstein was far less prolific, currently years behind on a book about Hillary Clinton that he’s under contract to write.
Could Bernstein and Woodward have done the same investigative job in today’s media world? Shepard doesn’t think so, given the lack of time and resources allowed for investigation in today’s 24-7 news cycle. “Bradlee would be telling Bernstein or Woodward, ‘Can you get it on the Net by noon?’ she said.
choover@wacotrib.com