The strange, and occasionally violent, origins of American news (opens in new tab)

Early in my career, I landed a job at a local newspaper. It was a small-town daily with one editor and three reporters, and I only took the position because I was fresh out of college, and it paid 25 cents more an hour than my gig at the take-and-bake pizzeria. Looking back, I’m not nostalgic for the crushing grind or the strangely personalized abuse the paper’s readers could hurl over a simple spelling error. But if you caught me in a sentimental mood, I would admit that the experience ingra...