It was a simpler time
in mid-century America, and a simpler world-view prevailed. There were
good guys and bad guys, and Anderson saw his job as helping the one and
exposing the other. His column was the most influential in the nation,
carried by hundreds of newspaper
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While a disapproving Washington Post
relegated him to the comics pages, his scoops could not be
ignored---from the cash payments billionaire Howard Hughes secretly
funneled to both the
Nixon and Humphrey campaigns to the CIA's clandestine hiring of Mafiosi
to try to kill Fidel Castro (and the execution of Anderson's Mafia
source as a result).
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In the mid-1960s,
Anderson's exposés of the corrupt Senator Thomas Dodd should have
earned him a Pulitzer. So should his unearthing of a smoking-gun memo
by an a corporate lobbyist admitting that the company paid off the
Nixon campaign to kill anti-trust prosecution. But jealous competitors
refused to recognize his work and even blackballed Anderson from the
prestigious insider's Gridiron Club.
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Anderson's adversaries in government were even more
aggressive. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover resorted to animal metaphors
to describe the columnist---"a rat of the worst type," "a flea-ridden
dog" and "lower than the regurgitated filth of vultures...he'll go
lower than dog shit for a story." The last, at least, was true;
Anderson's staff rifled through Hoover's trash, including his dog's
feces, largely because Anderson thought Hoover had gotten too powerful
and needed to be put in his place. At the time, presidents and
congressmen were afraid to take on Hoover because of his dossiers
crammed with derogatory information about them. |
Soundbytes
Click here to listen to Jack Anderson discussing his early experiences with FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover.
Click here to view the audio transcript as a Word document.
Click here to view the audio transcript as a .pdf file (requires Adobe Acrobat to view)
JOHP:: Jack Anderson Resources::
Jack Anderson Bio
The Early Years
The Young Reporter
Senator Joseph McCarthy
President Nixon
