The Conscience of a City and a Nation is the first comprehensive biography of Paul Block Jr., son of a publishing giant who owned newspapers across the United States. Block was passionate about studying chemistry, which he studied at Columbia and Yale. However, following his father’s death, he stepped in to help run papers the Blocks owned in Pittsburgh and Toledo. Eventually, Block and his family relocated to Toledo, one of Ohio’s up-and-coming cities.

Steven L Herman, chief national correspondent for the nonpartisan, government-funded Voice of America (VOA), weaves together memoir and history to pull back the curtain on the inner workings of the White House press corps, giving readers a rare glimpse into the historic and current relationship between the president and the press.

In one of her escapades as a reporter for Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World, the renowned Nellie Bly feigned insanity in 1889 and slipped, undercover, behind the grim walls of Blackwell’s Island mental asylum. She emerged ten days later with a vivid tale about life in a madhouse. Her asylum articles merged sympathy and sensationalism, highlighting a developing professional identity—that of the American newspaperwoman.