Almanac of Story Tellers: Carl Bernstein

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, in podcasts, and in books. 

Today is a story of February 14th

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    It is the 45th day of the year, leaving 320 days remaining in 2023.

    On this date in 1944, the investigative reporter Carl Bernstein was born.

   

    He tells his stories about politicians -- some of them corrupt, which means he must do a lots of digging. He is best known for digging into the political story of our time, Richard Nixon and Watergate, which led to the only presidential resignation in U.S. history.

    Along with Bob Woodward, a fellow reporter at The Washington Post, they broke the story of the Watergate conspiracy. They told how Nixon and his aides covered up the story of how and why his 1972 re-election campaign broke into Democratic headquarters in the Watergate office complex.

Bernstein and Woodward

    Woodward and Bernstein, then young reporters at The Post, were often alone in their quest to investigate the Nixon administration's actions. Backed only by their newspaper, they uncovered dozens of presidential activities that shocked the nation, led to Congressional investigations, grand jury indictments, and a House committee voting to impeach the president. Nixon resigned before that action took place.

    The pair and their newspaper won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for Public Service.

    Bernstein started working at 16 as a copy boy for the old Washington Star. He then worked as a reporter for The Elizabeth (N.J.) Daily Journal before returning to Washington as a reporter for The Post.

      He wrote two books with Woodward after the Watergate sage: All The President's Men, the story of what happened and how; and The Final Days, about the president's resignation. 

    In the years after Watergate, Bernstein has continued working as a journalist and commentator, mostly in television news. He has written books on Hillary Clinton and Pope John Paul II. His most recent book is a memoir, Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom.

    He lives in New York.