Search Results for: oral history

Longreads Best of 2012: Nicholas Jackson

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Nicholas Jackson is the digital editorial director for Outside magazine. A former associate editor at The Atlantic, he has also worked for Slate,Texas MonthlyEncyclopaedia Britannica, and other publications.

Best Argument for the Magazine
The Innocent Man, Part One” (Pamela Colloff, Texas Monthly)
The Innocent Man, Part Two” (Pamela Colloff, Texas Monthly)

I was going to give this two-parter from the always-great Pamela Colloff (seriously, go back through her 15-year archive at Texas Monthly for compelling narratives on everything from quinceañeras to school prayer to a piece on David Koresh and the 1993 Branch Davidian raid that should serve as a model for all future oral history projects) the award for best crime story, but it’s so much more than that. The tale of Michael Morton, who spent 25 years wrongfully imprisoned for brutally murdering his wife, has been told before, in newspapers and on television. But it has never been told like this. Over two installments across two issues—who does that anymore?—Colloff slowly reveals the cold details and intimate vignettes that only months of hard reporting can uncover, keeping the reader hanging on to each sentence. You already know how this story ends; you’ve read it before. And that might make you wonder—but only for a split second—why it was assigned and pursued. For the handful of big magazines left, this is as compelling an argument you can make for continued existence: only with hundreds of interviews, weeks of travel, and many late nights can you craft something this complete and this strong. It’s a space most publications can’t play in; it’s prohibitively expensive—and a gamble—to invest the necessary resources. You may be able to tell Morton’s story in book form, but you wouldn’t have the tightness and intensity (just try putting this one down) that Colloff’s story has, even at something like 30,000 words. And you wouldn’t want to lose her for a year or two anyway; we’re all anxiously awaiting her next piece.

Best Crime Story of the Year
The Truck Stop Killer” (Vanessa Veselka, GQ)

Who is Vanessa Veselka? A self-described “teenage runaway, expatriate, union organizer, and student of paleontology,” she’s relatively new to the magazine world. (Her first novel, Zazen, came out just last year—and won the 2012 PEN/Robert W. Bingham prize for fiction.) But she’s spent years building up a lifetime of experiences that, while many of us may not be able to directly relate to (and would never hope to), we all want to hear about. This, her first piece for GQ, takes you back to the summer of 1985, when Veselka hitched a ride with a stranger who may have been Robert Ben Rhoades, the sadistic killer who has admitted to killing three people, including a 14-year-old girl in Illinois, and is currently serving life sentences.

Best Profile of the Year
The Honor System” (Chris Jones, Esquire)

Chris Jones, who made a stink on Twitter (he’s infamous for making stinks of all kinds on Twitter) when his excellent profile of Roger Ebert wasn’t named a finalist for a National Magazine Award a couple of years ago, must really be bummed to learn that the American Society of Magazine Editors, the awards’ governing body, has killed the category entirely this year. I’ve had some public clashes with the guy—he can turn your mood cloudy with 140 characters or less—but on this I do commiserate, because “The Honor System,” his profile of Teller (you know him as the silent one from Vegas superstar magic duo Penn & Teller), would have finally brought home that statue of which he was robbed. And rightfully so. This story, which revolves around Teller’s attempts—legal and otherwise—to put an end to trick theft, a commonplace practice (who knew?) in that community, will leave you believing in magic.

Best Reason to Never Skip a Service Package Again
Daddy: My Father’s Last Words” (Mark Warren, Esquire)

Magazines are filled with service content: How to do this, when to do that. Readers love it, no matter what they tell you. That’s why every single month Cosmopolitan is able to convince its readers that there are 100 new things you must know about how to please your man. And why Men’s Health‘s website isn’t really much about health at all, but about lists and checklists and charts (most of them having to do with sex). Esquire‘s Father’s Day package was packed with similarly light content: how to plan for a visit from your now-adult kids, what to get dad on that special day, etc. But tucked between those graphics and croutons (the term some of the lady mags use to refer to those bite-size bits of content) was a knock-you-on-your-ass piece from the magazine’s long-time executive editor, Mark Warren, on the long and trying relationship he had (we all have) with dad.

Best Technology Story of the Year 
When the Nerds Go Marching In” (Alexis Madrigal, The Atlantic)

He’s been called the first social media president and he’s even done an Ask Me Anything on Reddit. You know all about Barack Obama’s Internet prowess from the 2008 campaign: his ability to get young people to follow his every word on Twitter and donate in small amounts—but by the millions—to his election fund. The presence of Chris Hughes, a former Mark Zuckerberg roommate and a founder of Facebook, during that first cycle solidified this position for Obama. (That he was running against a 72-year-old white dude from Arizona didn’t hurt). But there’s a whole lot of work that goes on behind the scenes. In “When the Nerds Go Marching In,” Madrigal, a senior editor and lead technology writer for The Atlantic, pulls back the curtain, introducing you to Harper Reed, Dylan Richard, and Mark Trammell, Obama’s dream team of engineers, and makes you wish you would have sat at the smart table every once in a while in high school.

Best Story About Child Development of the Year
What’s So Bad About a Boy Who Wants to Wear a Dress?” (Ruth Padawer, The New York Times Magazine)


This is a great—and important—story about the evolving model of parenting gender-fluid children, and a reminder that we all can—and should—be a little more open-minded and accepting of others. But really, the entire staff of The New York Times Magazine deserves an award for its commitment to complicated—and controversial—pieces like this one. This year alone, under the direction of Hugo Lindgren, the magazine has produced this cover story as well as big cover stories on the new psychological science that has us pegging people as psychopaths as early as kindergarten, and the first long-form piece on the Tourette’s-like twitching epidemic that affected 18 teenagers in Le Roy, New York.

Best Story I Thought I Would Never Like
What Does a Conductor Do?” (Justin Davidson, New York)

If, like me, you’ve never really appreciated classical music (and statistics show that you are, in fact, like me—at least when it comes to Mozart), you’ll probably never feel compelled to click on that little link up there. But I have an obsession with Adam Moss’ New York magazine, which is certainly the best weekly currently being produced today, and I dogear my way through a stack that slowly grows as new issues arrive until I’ve read every story and every page. That’s how I came to read classical music and architecture critic Justin Davidson’s first-person feature story on stepping up to the podium to lead an orchestra on his own. You may not have the same compulsions I do—this is where we differ—but trust me on this one.

Best Adventure Story of the Year
Four Confirmed Dead in Two Days on Everest” (Grayson Schaffer, Outside)

Earlier this year, we sent senior editor Grayson Schaffer to Everest Base Camp for a climbing season that turned out to be one of the deadliest in history. For six weeks, he reported from 17,000 feet while body after body fell (10, by the time the season came to a close) as a record number of climbers attempted to summit the world’s tallest peak. Everest, over the years, has become something of a sideshow, with sham outfitters promising to take anyone with a fat checkbook to the top, regardless of experience or ability. But it remains a powerful symbol, and as long as we desire a challenge (or just an escape from day to day drudgery), it’ll continue to lure people in.

Best New Writer Discovery of the Year
Riccardo Tisci: Designer of the Year” (Molly Young, GQ)

A little bit of post-read Googling (and messages from a couple of Twitter followers) quickly alerted me to the fact that Molly Young, with past pieces in New YorkElle, and The Believer, among others, isn’t all that new to the game. But I had somehow never recognized her byline before. After reading her profile of Riccardo Tisci, the Italian fashion designer who currently serves as the creative director of Givenchy (“Across from me a nucleus of attendants has formed around Amar’e Stoudemire, thanks less to his fame (there are better celebrities here) than to his height, which gives him a reassuring lighthouse quality.”), I’ll make sure to never miss it again.

Best Trainwreck of the Year
In Conversation: Tina Brown” (Michael Kinsley, New York)

I was going to select a piece from Newsweek for this honor, given that this is the last year the publication will technically qualify (it’ll morph into a new product, Newsweek Global, when it transitions to online-only next year), but it hasn’t published anything this year that could crack my top 10. What does, though, is the interview between Newsweek‘s top editor, Tina Brown, and Michael Kinsley that ran in New York. It’s not great in any traditional sense—after every page you’re left wondering when Kinsley will ask this question or that question, and he never does—but it’s compelling from the first question to the last because of the oversize roles both subjects have played in our modern media.

Read more guest picks from Longreads Best of 2012.

An oral history of the Beltway sniper attacks that occurred during three weeks in October 2002. Ten people were killed, three people were injured, and many people were too afraid to leave their homes:

Iran Brown, victim, now 23: ‘I remember every detail, down to what I ate for breakfast: chocolate-chip waffles. My aunt drove me to school, and it was very early because she had to go to work. I was the first to arrive.

‘I got hit right under my left chest. I fell to the ground. A teacher came out to help me. I had my hand over the wound, but it wasn’t like in the movies with blood gushing out. I explained that I’d been shot and needed help, but it didn’t seem to register in her brain.

‘My aunt heard the shot and reversed the car when she saw me on the ground. I got up on my own and walked to the car. Of course, I’m panicking and praying. Reality is kicking in. My aunt was a nurse, so she knew more than the average person. She rushed me to a clinic.

‘I had been watching the news. I was aware of what was happening. I had asked our PE teacher why we were going outside if the sniper was in the area.

“Terror in October: A Look Back at the DC Sniper Attacks.” — Alicia C. Shepard, Washingtonian

More from the Washingtonian

Terror in October: A Look Back at the DC Sniper Attacks

Longreads Pick

An oral history of the Beltway sniper attacks that occurred during three weeks in October 2002. Ten people were killed, three people were injured, and many people were too afraid to leave their homes:

Iran Brown, victim, now 23: ‘I remember every detail, down to what I ate for breakfast: chocolate-chip waffles. My aunt drove me to school, and it was very early because she had to go to work. I was the first to arrive.

“‘I got hit right under my left chest. I fell to the ground. A teacher came out to help me. I had my hand over the wound, but it wasn’t like in the movies with blood gushing out. I explained that I’d been shot and needed help, but it didn’t seem to register in her brain.

“‘My aunt heard the shot and reversed the car when she saw me on the ground. I got up on my own and walked to the car. Of course, I’m panicking and praying. Reality is kicking in. My aunt was a nurse, so she knew more than the average person. She rushed me to a clinic.

“‘I had been watching the news. I was aware of what was happening. I had asked our PE teacher why we were going outside if the sniper was in the area.’

Source: Washingtonian
Published: Oct 1, 2012
Length: 31 minutes (7,862 words)

[Not single-page] An oral history of the TV show “Cheers”:

Danson: I’ll tell you about the worst day of my life. Shelley and Rhea were carrying that week’s episode, and the guys were just, ‘Let’s play hooky.’ We’d never done anything wrong before. John had a boat, so we met at Marina del Rey at 8 a.m. We all called in sick, and Jimmy caught on and was so pissed. Woody and I were already stoned, and Woody said, ‘You want to try some mushrooms?’ I’d never had them, so I’m handed this bag and I took a fistful. On our way to Catalina, we hit the tail end of a hurricane, and even people who were sober were getting sick. Woody and I thought we were going to die for three hours. I sat next to George, and every sixty seconds or so he’d poke me and go, ‘Breathe.’ [gasp] And I’d come back to life.

Harrelson: I was a little worried about him. It looked like his face was melting. I think I may have been freaking a little myself, but I had to be cool about it.

Wendt: We got into serious trouble for that. I think we thought Jimmy and Les and Glen would have more of a sense of humor about it. We did it because Ted was doing it. He’s sort of a reluctant leader. He didn’t try to flex his influence. He’s just eminently followable.

“‘The Best TV Show That’s Ever Been’.” — Brian Raftery, GQ

More by Raftery

‘The Best TV Show That’s Ever Been’

Longreads Pick

[Not single-page] An oral history of the TV show “Cheers”:

Danson: I’ll tell you about the worst day of my life. Shelley and Rhea were carrying that week’s episode, and the guys were just, ‘Let’s play hooky.’ We’d never done anything wrong before. John had a boat, so we met at Marina del Rey at 8 a.m. We all called in sick, and Jimmy caught on and was so pissed. Woody and I were already stoned, and Woody said, ‘You want to try some mushrooms?’ I’d never had them, so I’m handed this bag and I took a fistful. On our way to Catalina, we hit the tail end of a hurricane, and even people who were sober were getting sick. Woody and I thought we were going to die for three hours. I sat next to George, and every sixty seconds or so he’d poke me and go, ‘Breathe.’ [gasp] And I’d come back to life.

Harrelson: I was a little worried about him. It looked like his face was melting. I think I may have been freaking a little myself, but I had to be cool about it.

Wendt: We got into serious trouble for that. I think we thought Jimmy and Les and Glen would have more of a sense of humor about it. We did it because Ted was doing it. He’s sort of a reluctant leader. He didn’t try to flex his influence. He’s just eminently followable.

Source: GQ
Published: Sep 27, 2012
Length: 47 minutes (11,853 words)

Thirty years after seven people in Chicago died after taking cyanide-laced Tylenol, investigators, law enforcement officers, health and public officials, and friends and family members recount how it all unfolded. The perpetrator was never found, and the case was recently reopened:

Nurse Jensen

The [Janus] family was all at Adam’s house, planning the funeral and mourning together. Adam’s younger brother, Stanley [Janus], had some chronic back pain. And he asked his wife—they had been married just a little while, and her name was also Theresa—to get him some Tylenol. And she came out and gave him two Tylenol, and then she took two Tylenol. And then he went down. And then she went down.

Charles Kramer

Lieutenant with the Arlington Heights Fire Department [to the Daily Herald]

When I arrived at the house, there were cars and people everywhere. All eight of my men were working, four on one man and four on a woman. Everything that would happen to the man happened to the woman a few minutes later.

Dr. Kim

As I was putting on my blue blazer to leave, around 5:30, a nurse told me that they were bringing the Janus family back. And I said, ‘Well, it’s probably the parents,’ because they were feeble and they might have been very upset. And the nurse said, ‘No, it’s his brother.’ I had been talking to this six-foot healthy guy. And I said, ‘Well, what happened? Did he faint?’ And she said, ‘They are doing CPR—and they are working on his wife too.’ That’s when I took my blazer off.

“Chicago Tylenol Murders: An Oral History.” — David Zivan, Chicago Magazine

More from Chicago Magazine

An oral history of Burning Man, which started as an effigy burning in 1986 on San Francisco’s Baker Beach, and moved to the Black Rock Desert in 1990 to become one of the largest annual gatherings of inventors, artists and free spirits:

ALAN “REVEREND AL” RIDENOUR (head of Los Angeles Cacophony): In ’96, Burning Man was at its peak. We did the Damnation of Tinseltown and the flaming Helco tower. Burn Night felt like a scary, transformative ritual. Flash played Satan, and he came through with a gas can and doused Doris Day and John Wayne. I was on acid when I heard Flash’s booming laugh. He was Satan.

ELIZABETH GILBERT (author of Eat, Pray, Love who wrote about Burning Man ’96 for Spin): Honestly, I was scared of it. I remember the way the camp turned from this playful thing by day—beautiful and fanciful and Narnia-like—to this menacing thing at night. Being around all that fire, people with guns, and a lot of people on drugs, I was like, “They’ll be eating each other soon!” And in some ways they were—more sexually than anything else. I understood that Burning Man was waking something up. That awakening might lead to transcendent creativity—or it might be savage and ungovernable once it’s released.

“Hot Mess.” — Brad Wieners, Outside magazine

More from Outside Magazine

Hot Mess

Longreads Pick

An oral history of Burning Man, which started as an effigy burning in 1986 on San Francisco’s Baker Beach, and moved to the Black Rock Desert in 1990 to become one of the largest annual gatherings of inventors, artists and free spirits:

ALAN “REVEREND AL” RIDENOUR (head of Los Angeles Cacophony): In ’96, Burning Man was at its peak. We did the Damnation of Tinseltown and the flaming Helco tower. Burn Night felt like a scary, transformative ritual. Flash played Satan, and he came through with a gas can and doused Doris Day and John Wayne. I was on acid when I heard Flash’s booming laugh. He was Satan.

ELIZABETH GILBERT (author of Eat, Pray, Love who wrote about Burning Man ’96 for Spin): Honestly, I was scared of it. I remember the way the camp turned from this playful thing by day—beautiful and fanciful and Narnia-like—to this menacing thing at night. Being around all that fire, people with guns, and a lot of people on drugs, I was like, “They’ll be eating each other soon!” And in some ways they were—more sexually than anything else. I understood that Burning Man was waking something up. That awakening might lead to transcendent creativity—or it might be savage and ungovernable once it’s released.”

Source: Outside
Published: Aug 24, 2012
Length: 24 minutes (6,209 words)

An oral history of the first all-sports talk station, WFAN, which included Don Imus, Mike Francesca, and Christopher “Mad Dog” Russo:

Jeff Smulyan (founder and CEO, Emmis Broadcasting): Imus was just getting out of rehab when we bought the station. His agent was a friend of mine; we laughed because we had a bad radio station and a bad personality who’s probably going to be a drug addict for the rest of his life and a baseball team [the Mets] with rumors about drugs. It was kind of like the grand slam.

Mike Breen (updates, ‘Imus in the Morning’): He was a bad drunk and a drug addict. You didn’t know what you were gonna get. The first day I started working with Imus at NBC, I asked the program director to bring me back to meet him; it was two o’clock in the afternoon and he was drunk. So the program director says, ‘Can this kid fill in on sports for Don Criqui tomorrow?’ And Imus was like, ‘Sure, now get out of my office.’ He didn’t even look up. When I went in the next day, I sat down and he had no idea who I was. So he shuts his mic off and he looks at me and he says, ‘Who the f—- are you?’ I said, ‘I’m filling in for Criqui.’ He turns his mic back on and he says to Charles McCord, ‘Charles, do you know this kid? He claims he’s fillin’ in for Criqui.’ Now this is on the air, this part. So he spent the next 10 minutes interviewing me, asking me how I got to work on his show.

“The Sound and the Fury.” — Alex French and Howie Kahn, Grantland

More from Grantland

The Sound and the Fury

Longreads Pick

An oral history of the first all-sports talk station, WFAN, which included Don Imus, Mike Francesca, and Christopher “Mad Dog” Russo:

Jeff Smulyan (founder and CEO, Emmis Broadcasting): Imus was just getting out of rehab when we bought the station. His agent was a friend of mine; we laughed because we had a bad radio station and a bad personality who’s probably going to be a drug addict for the rest of his life and a baseball team [the Mets] with rumors about drugs. It was kind of like the grand slam.

Mike Breen (updates, ‘Imus in the Morning’): He was a bad drunk and a drug addict. You didn’t know what you were gonna get. The first day I started working with Imus at NBC, I asked the program director to bring me back to meet him; it was two o’clock in the afternoon and he was drunk. So the program director says, ‘Can this kid fill in on sports for Don Criqui tomorrow?’ And Imus was like, ‘Sure, now get out of my office.’ He didn’t even look up. When I went in the next day, I sat down and he had no idea who I was. So he shuts his mic off and he looks at me and he says, ‘Who the f— are you?’ I said, ‘I’m filling in for Criqui.’ He turns his mic back on and he says to Charles McCord, ‘Charles, do you know this kid? He claims he’s fillin’ in for Criqui.’ Now this is on the air, this part. So he spent the next 10 minutes interviewing me, asking me how I got to work on his show.”

Source: Grantland
Published: Jul 10, 2012
Length: 62 minutes (15,675 words)