Herbert Bayard Swope

Herbert Bayard Swope, the son of German immigrants Ida Cohn and Isaac Swope, was born in St. Louis, Missouri on 5th January, 1882.

Swope became a reporter with the New York World. During the First World War a series of articles entitled "Inside the German Empire" won him the Pulitizer Prize for reporting. A book of these articles, German Empire: In the Third Year of the War, was published in 1917.

Swope was willing to tackle controversial subjects. He once said that: "I can't give you a sure-fire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time."

After the war Swope was appointed editor of the newspaper. Briton Hadden was a young journalist who wanted to work under Swope. Hadden marched into Swope's office unanounced. Swope yelled: "Who are you." He replied: "My name is Briton Hadden, and I want a job." When the editor told him to get out, he commented: "Mr. Swope, you're interfering with my destiny." Intrigued, Swope asked Hadden what his destiny entailed. He then gave him a detailed account of his plans to publish a news magazine but first he felt he had to learn his craft under Swope. Impressed by his answer, Swope gave him a job on his newspaper.

Hadden's reports soon became appearing on the front page. Swope liked Hadden's conservational style of writing and began giving him the top stories to cover. One of his fellow reporters suggested that Hadden had an "intelligent brain, with baby thoughts". Swope also invited him to his house for dinner and became attending his legendry parties, where he met the writer, F. Scott Fitzgerald, who later used these experiences for his masterpiece, The Great Gatsby (1925).

In October 1921 Swope started a 21-day crusade against the Ku Klux Klan in October 1921, which won the newspaper the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 1922. It has been claimed that this was one of the most important examples of investigative journalism in American history.

Herbert Bayard Swope died on 20th June, 1958.