Pollner lecture to explore work
of Civil War correspondents

By Chelsi Moy
J-School Web Reporter

After reporting from the front line and seeing its dangers firsthand, Tom Cheatham is fascinated by the struggles of earlier war correspondents, and he will focus his upcoming Pollner Lecture on Civil War journalists
.
"It’s important to have an appreciation for what predecessors in the business went through," said Cheatham, the School of Journalism’s Pollner professor in the Autumn 2002 semester.

Photo by Josh Parker

Pollner Professor Tom Cheatham and his War Correspondence seminar take part in a conference call with Fred Francis, an NBC correspondent in Washington D.C. Cheatham and his students were asking Francis about covering wartime news and how it relates to the present situation with Iraq.

Cheatham, an on-call producer for NBC, has reported on foreign affairs for most of his career. He was a war correspondent in Vietnam and covered Israel’s bombing of Iraq’s nuclear reactor in 1981 and the civil war in Rwanda.

He lives in Durango Colo., but is visiting the J-school as the T. Anthony Pollner Fellow during the fall semester. At the J-school, he is teaching a seminar that traces war correspondence through history, focusing primarily on changes in censorship and media access.

While he was researching historical texts and documents for the class, Civil War correspondents intrigued him. "I didn’t expect to get drawn into it as deeply as I have," he said.

During the Civil War, people relied solely on newspapers to convey news. This created intense competition between journalists, said Cheatham. Reporters would put their lives in danger so their newspaper could be the first to publish a story.

"The quickest journalists were the most successful," he said.

Civil War journalist George Smalley, who wrote about the Battle of Antietam, especially fascinated him. Smalley’s struggle on the front line was as impressive as the story he brought back to the readers, said Cheatham.

"It’s the greatest battle account of all time," he said. "It is absolute poetry."

Cheatham wants to recognize these unknown war heroes.

"I ought to produce a documentary or something," he said. "Their story hasn’t been appreciated."

The Civil War not only brought about the first use of the term "war correspondent," but also established military censorship. "It’s a thread that has been carried through," Cheatham said.
Since the Civil War, censorship has increased, and the media’s access to the frontlines is considerably more regulated, he said.

Cheatham is the second Pollner Fellow at the J-School. The fellowship was established in memory of T. Anthony Pollner, a 1999 J-school graduate and Kaimin reporter who died in a motorcycle accident in 2000. His family created an endowment in his name, allowing a distinguished journalist to visit the J-school one semester each year to teach a seminar and work with Kaimin reporters.

The Pollner family also requested that all Pollner professors give a speech on a topic of their choice, said Carol Van Valkenburg, chair of the print journalism department.

The Pollner Lecture is scheduled for Oct. 21 at 8 p.m. in the University Center Theater. Admission is free.

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