Gems of the Year
Trying to pick the best news gems of 2006 hasn't been easy. From the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan to the domestic debates over immigration and education, journalists produced some incredible stories last year. There were compelling narratives, deep investigations and powerful multimedia packages.
I started with a list of 40 top gems and managed to narrow it down to a dozen finalists. They came from a weekly community paper, metropolitan dailies, broadcasts networks and a national magazine. Here they are, the Top 12 Gems of 2006:
12. "The Fragile Ones" by Kara Platoni of the East Bay Express is a beautifully written story about 8-year-old Lucas Clark, who has Fragile X Syndrome. Platoni excels at explaining the intricacies of the genetic disorder while showing the daily struggles and small victories of a little boy and the people who care for him.
11. Abraham McLaughlin of the Christian Science Monitor created a fascinating series about the capacity of the human heart. His "Paths to Forgiveness" explores how some Africans who have lived through unimaginable horror have found ways to reconcile with their former tormentors. One story describes a Rwandan woman who now employs the people who may have killed her family. Another looks at how members of a Ugandan community welcomed home former soldiers in the Lord's Resistance Army, which had once chopped off its enemies limbs and forced children into slavery. A third follows the marriage of a Hutu man and a Tutsi woman in Burundi whose love flourishes despite the frequent clashes between their people. McLaughlin's writing is full of vivid details, and Melanie Stetson Freeman's photos capture the emotion of these people's dramatic stories.
10. In "Debtor's Hell," Boston Globe reporters Michael Rezendes, Beth Healy, Francie Latour and Heather Allen along with photographer Michele McDonald show how millions of Americans are suffering at the hands of debt collectors, the courts and law enforcement agents. According to the Globe team, "almost unnoticed by policy-makers, many millions of Americans have slid, or been pushed, into a debtor's hell where bank accounts are drained, wages are attached, property confiscated, and threats of jail are an everyday occurrence." Rezendes, Healy, Latour and Allen do a strong job of explaining how the system works against consumers and offer powerful examples such as the woman whose car was swiped by debt collectors even though her debts had been erased. Walter V. Robinson edited the series.
9. They work as camel racers, prostitutes, servants and field hands. They are some of the estimated 1.2 million children forced into indentured servitude around the world every year, and Sharon LaFraniere of the New York Times chronicles their plight with "Africa’s World of Forced Labor, in a 6-Year-Old’s Eyes." LaFraniere personalizes the numbing statistics by taking us to Ghana and describing how 6-year-old Mark Kwadwo spends his days sitting in a canoe in his underwear and Little Mermaid T-shirt, bailing water for a brutal fisherman. This is a heart-breaking story that deserves the world's attention.
8. Reporter Ron Matus and photographer Lara Cerri of the St. Petersburg Times brilliantly bring to life what it's like to be in ninth grade with their "Ninth or Never." Matus and Cerri profile four diverse ninth-graders at St. Pete's Northeast High School as they navigate the tumult of their home lives and the increasing demands of a year that some educators consider the toughest for students. By sharing the lives of these ninth-graders, Matus and Cerri give us insight into why so many kids drop out of ninth grade and how some manage to survive.
7. NBC's Ann Curry deserves a standing ovation for making the difficult journey to the border between Sudan and Chad to report on the massacres that have killed up to 400,000 men, women and children in the Darfur region. On the NBC Nightly News and the Today Show, Curry told the story of Jamaya, a young woman who walked barefoot 40 miles to a refugee camp after Arab militias called Janjaweed stormed her village and threatened to kill all the men. In addition to the print and broadcast versions of this story, the Nightly News Web package includes Curry's photo journal from the refugee camps, her personal commentary and a list of ways that viewers can help alleviate the crisis. Curry traveled to Africa with Nicholas D. Kristof of the New York Times, whose well-reported columns have served as the media's conscience on Darfur.
6. What would a barrier along the 2,000-mile border between the U.S. and Mexico really mean? The Arizona Daily Star decided to find out by sending a six-person team to travel the entire length of the border from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico. Along the way, they interviewed more than 200 people who patrol the border, study it and live and work nearby. The resulting four-part "Sealing our Borders" includes lively videos and great photos by James Gregg, Kelly Presnell and Lindsay A. Miller. The 360-degree panoramic photos of different points along the border are especially intriguing.
5. PBS Frontline correspondent Martin Smith produced a superb documentary that shows us the area where Osama bin Laden may be hiding and where Al Qaeda and its Taliban allies are regaining strength. Smith's "Return of the Taliban" takes us to the lawless northern regions of Pakistan, rarely seen by foreigners, and explores the complex web of relationships among local tribesmen, Al Qaeda, the Taliban and Pakistan's military and secret services. He reveals how weapons, money and fighters are flowing through this Taliban sanctuary to the rebels fighting U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
4. "Through Hell and High Water" by Jane O. Hansen of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reads like a novel. In the first chapter she introduces us to two seriously ill young men, Hunter Reeves and Preston Johnson, and their mothers, who grow close as they keep a close bedside watch over their sons. She shows us the setting: Charity Hospital for poor patients and Tulane University Hospital and Clinic for wealthier ones, across the street from each other in New Orleans. And she starts the plot racing as Hurricane Katrina bears down on the city and the two hospitals lose power. Hansen's narrative power and insightful reporting create a powerful story about heroism and despair as patients, their families, doctors and nurses struggle to survive through Katrina's wrath.
3. Tim McGirk of Time broke the chilling investigation of whether a battalion of U.S. Marines massacred 15 civilians, including women and children, in western Iraq. "One Morning in Haditha" explores how the Marines responded after insurgents killed Lance Corporal Miguel (T.J.) Terrazas. The Marines initially said the civilians died in the same blast that killed Terrazas, but witnesses and doctors claim the civilians died the next day when the Marines went on a rampage of revenge. McGirk deserves credit for pushing ahead with a difficult investigation despite the military's initial denials.
2. During 2006 the Seattle Times successfully fought to open up King County, Wash., court records that hid vital information for the public. For the "Your Courts, Their Secrets" series, reporters Ken Armstrong, Steve Miletich and Justin Mayo discovered 420 civil cases that judges and court commissioners had sealed improperly. The Times team found that these court files included evidence that a childcare center is responsible for sex abuse, a medical device malfunctions, a social services agency allowed the rape of a 13-year-old girl and a school district covered up an elementary school teacher's long history of fondling students. Through this well-written and impressively reported series, Miletich, Mayo and Armstrong succeed in showing how closed records can hurt the public.
1. Paul Salopek of the Chicago Tribune has already won two Pulitzers and may be heading for his third with the monumental "A Tank of Gas, a World of Trouble." Along with photographer Kuni Takahashi and researcher Brenda Kilianski, he retraced the journey of a tank of gas from where it's pumped at a suburban Chicago station back to its origins in the oil fields of Iraq, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf of Mexico, Venezuela and other spots around the world. Salopek weaves throughout his story profiles of the people affected by the same oil, from the gas clerks who sell it to the Nigerian men whose fishing grounds have been polluted by it. The Web package includes creative touches such as a ticker that shows how many barrels of oil the U.S. has consumed since you first click on the story. This package is a brilliant idea that is deeply reported and sharply written.
Any stories that you think should have made the list but didn't? Feel free to add a comment suggesting your favorites.
Finally, a big thanks to all the News Gems readers who sent me tips during 2006. I greatly appreciate your help.