When I interviewed Falk on the Burbank Studios lot in 1986 it was easy to see where the lovable Columbo got his eccentricities — and his raincoat. One of my favorite interviews in LA in the ‘80s was with the beloved actor Peter Falk, who died in 2011. 1986 “Columbo” the TV show may have…
Read More ...The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette gives some kind ink to me and my book about its greatest journalist, Ray Sprigle
From the Post-Gazette: Author Bill Steigerwald recounts Ray Sprigle’s journey in ’30 Days A Black Man’ June 14, 2017 12:00 AM By Maria Sciullo / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Author Bill Steigerwald believes that Ray Sprigle was the Roberto Clemente of journalism. Both men were superstars in their fields but never achieved the level of deserved acclaim…
Read More ...Large thanks to Bookish59 and LibraryThing for a sweet review of “30 Days …”
Big thanks to Brenda of Queens, N.Y., for the smart, snappy and complimentary 5-star review of 30 Days a Black Man that she wrote for LibraryThing, the cataloging and social networking site for book lovers. Brenda, aka “Bookish 59,” has read and reviewed hundreds of books. If they’re half as good as the she wrote…
Read More ...Parents should be able to shop for public schools in a city the same way they shop for groceries or cars
It’s not possible to overstate the importance to libertarians of Richard Rothstein’s shocking The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America. It’s a great book and a damning indictment of the abuse of federal, state and local government power by racist politicians, housing policy-makers, urban planners, interstate highway designers and…
Read More ...Statues of Confederate generals and the evil stuff they really symbolize
It’s easy to understand why Washington Post columnist Jonathan Capehart really digs New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu. Despite whatever political muck Landrieu’s had to step in to climb out of the cesspool of Louisiana politics, he has impressed everyone as a wise, decent and principled man when it comes to dealing with race and black-white…
Read More ...More Bad Reporting on Pittsburgh, plus the Usual Uber Hate, from the New York Times
Once again, for the dozenth time in my lifetime, the New York Times parachutes in and writes about Pittsburgh in a lame, biased, sloppy way. Not only did the article erroneously talk about the Strip District being a place where steel mills once flourished, it also did its usual hate-job on Uber by under-mentioning the…
Read More ...Teaching economics to the man in the street or the man in the Oval Office is hard — unless you’re Professor Donald Boudreaux
Economics is not as difficult to understand as politicians, the main stream media or too many Econ 101 profs make it out to be. Every day for more than a decade at his web site Cafe Hayek Donald Boudreaux has provided coherent and valuable proof that basic principles like supply and demand — and more…
Read More ...Bill's Q&A's
Q&A: Tucker Carlson, before he became King of Cable — and GOP presidential timber
Bill Steigerwald is a veteran journalist from Pittsburgh. His new nonfiction book "30 Days a Black Man" tells the amazing but forgotten story about an undercover mission by a Pittsburgh newspaperman into the Jim Crow South in 1948 that shook up the whole country. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette star reporter Ray Sprigle's nationally syndicated series "In the Land of Jim Crow" exposed the iniquities and humiliations suffered by ten million black Americans in the segregated South. It shocked the white people of the North, angered the South and started the first national debate in the media about ending America's legal apartheid. Kirkus Review said "30 Days a Black Man" is "a fascinating account of an anti-Jim Crow muckraking adventure..." that Steigerwald turned "into rollicking, haunting American history." ... READ MORE