From Publishers Weekly
Enlisting at age 22, Mitgang was assigned to the Air Corps (then a branch of the U.S. Army), leaving for North Africa on a troopship in 1942. Stationed with the 5th Bomb Wing on the edge of the Sahara, he edited a mimeographed newsletter, Bombfighter Bulletin, which led to an editorial post with the armed forces newspaper Stars and Stripes. This is Mitgang’s memoir of his tenure as managing editor of the paper’s Sicily edition, and he shares recollections of covering the war with sharp clarity. He tells of listening to a captain and his men discuss bringing down the German-occupied Leaning Tower of Pisa: "I listened in fascination. What a story! To be present not at the creation but at the destruction of the world-famous landmark that had stood for some 800 years." He later moved on to man typewriters in Naples and Rome. Back in New York in 1945, a recommendation by cartoonist Bill Mauldin resulted in work on the screen treatment of Mauldin’s Up Front. Reprints of Stars and Stripes pieces by Mitgang, novelist Klaus Mann (Mephisto), paperback illustrator Stanley Meltzoff and others punctuate the pages. Mitgang has a razor-sharp memory and writes in such a fluid, lucid manner that some may wish he’d continued on, documenting his postwar career at the New York Times.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Book Description
This book is a personal memoir about the revered, longstanding armed forces newspaper Stars and Stripes, as told by an Army correspondent and managing editor of editions in North Africa and Sicily during World WarII.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Newsmen in Khaki is a personal memoir about the revered, longstanding armed forces newspaper The Stars and Stripes, as told by Herbert Mitgang, an army correspondent and managing editor of editions in North Africa and Sicily during World War II. After going AWOL from his Army Air Corps unit and risking court-martial to apply for a job as a soldier correspondent, Mitgang was surprised to receive direct orders from Gen. Dwight Eisenhower assigning him to The Stars and Stripes. Eisenhower, it turned out, "proved to be a great friend of a free press in the army newspaper, saving it from nonmilitary censorship, demands by self-promoting officers, and preachments by chaplains."

Whether accompanying bombing missions or paratroopers, entertaining a contessa or visiting refugee camps, Mitgang offers a poignant account of his experiences. In addition to his own reflections, Mitgang includes articles by other famous authors in uniform -- such as Irwin Shaw, Klaus Mann, and Bill Brinkley -- as well as the voices of many American GIs. Newsmen in Khaki also details the author's postwar career, most notably his long-running stint at the New York Times, where he served as an editor, columnist, book critic, editorial writer, and founder of the paper's op-ed page.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly