Speaker - Michael J. Birkner, Gettysburg College

This lecture is about journalists based in Australia practicing their craft in 1942, when the prospect of a Japanese invasion was impending. How did professional standards compare with daily practice? Most information came from official sources, and draft articles had to run the gantlet of military censors. What were the trade-offs for reporters, including self-censorship? How well did the journalists manage to inform their readers back home?

Michael J. Birkner is Professor of History at Gettysburg College, where he has taught since 1989. He is the author or editor of fourteen books and many articles on nineteenth- and twentieth-century American political history, including three edited volumes on Pennsylvania’s only president, James Buchanan, and three books on Dwight D. Eisenhower. In 2003 and 2006 he served as a member of the history jury for the Pulitzer Prize, chairing the jury in 2006.