FAIR ENOUGH: The Life of Westbrook Pegler

by Finish Farr ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1975

Better than Oliver Pilat's biography of Pegler which appeared ten years ago (generous mention of it is made by Mr. Fart). Murray Kempton commented, ""Westbrook Pegler is past all probability of rescue by fashion."" Fashion aside, one wonders about Pegler's interest for today's readers representing as he did the four-star heyday of journalism -- even The Front Page revival fizzled. In any case, Pegler spent ""sixty years of indignant writing"" even though it took him five hours to get a column on paper -- surprising in one of such volubility and belligerence. The son of a newspaper man, he finally made it with Roy Howard (Scripps-Howard) after the Depression, graduating from sports news to his own column -- Fair Enough -- where he veered unpredictably from left to outright reactionary and expressed some of his softhearted instincts and wrongheaded ideas (with the topic of unionism finally cleaving the long friendship with Broun). Pegler revered some people -- particularly Eleanor Roosevelt, murdered others (this was known as being peglerized) and at the end of his diminishing career, faced Quentin Reynolds' Nizer-defended lawsuit. . . . As a book, as an estimate, Fair Enough.

Pub Date: April 1, 1975

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Arlington House

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1975

Categories: NONFICTION