Books Man of All Media
Howie Carr’s latest bestseller recalls his storied career in newspapers, magazines, radio, and TV.
F BY MARISA HERMAN
rom being in the crosshairs of infamous crime boss Whitey Bulger to dining with former President Donald Trump, Howie Carr’s storied career in jour- nalism has been fi lled with assignments from the
dangerous to the delicious. Now, he’s using those experiences to give an inside look
at what it’s like to work in today’s news media. Carr has earned numerous awards and accolades during
more than four decades of working for newspapers, radio stations, magazines, and TV networks and writing bestsell- ing books. In his latest, Paper Boy: Read All About It!, the conserva-
tive talk show host decided he had enough unique stories under his belt. “I decided it was time to write my memoir,” Carr said. “I
had enough stories to tell to make it interesting. It’s a wrap- up of my whole career.” Carr’s 11th book touches on some topics he’s written
about before, including organized crime bosses, the Ken- nedy family, and politics. It also serves as a refl ection on the current state of the
U.S. media. “It’s a story about the decline of American mass media,” he said. Carr points out that when he started out as a cub reporter, “everyone read newspapers.” Now, with major newspapers in decline and more TV
watchers opting to “cut the cord” with their cable providers, Carr said the audience is totally fragmented. The best advice he has for the next generation of news-
writing hopefuls is to become your own boss. Carr owns the company that syndicates his weekday radio show to 25 sta- tions in New England. “I wish I became my own boss a lot earlier,” he said. From starting out his newspaper career at the Winston-
Salem Journal, one of North Carolina’s biggest daily papers, for $140 a week to covering Boston politics at the Boston Herald American, now the Boston Herald, the book spans Carr’s various jobs and roles through the years. But despite having covered riots, strikes, and numerous
murder trials, he writes that nothing could have prepared him for the politics of Boston City Hall, where the mayor had “virtually unlimited powers.” When legendary mayor Kevin White quit in 1984 after 16
years in offi ce, he said one of the things he was most look- ing forward to in his impending retirement was “not having Howie” chase him around the city.
56 NEWSMAX | DECEMBER 2023 Carr also soon learned the struggles that could be involved
with working for a newspaper after he went to cash his pay- check and the bank teller informed him that the Herald American’s account had insuffi cient funds. Realizing he needed a new source of income, Carr
decided to enter the TV world — where he doubled his paycheck overnight. He quickly learned that the biggest diff erence between
writing and his new medium of reporting was the bread and butter of the TV gig: the live shot. Carr recalls struggling with speaking directly to the cam-
era live after the anchor would hand over the segment to him. “I was a real mess those fi rst few live shots,” he writes. But even if the early days were rough, Carr overcame the
early stumbles and ultimately made a name for himself as a journalist across all major platforms. His interest in Billy Bulger, the powerful president of the Massachusetts State Senate and brother of gangster Whitey Bulger, became the subject of his New York Times bestsell- ing book The Brothers Bulger: How They Terrorized and Cor- rupted Boston for a Quarter Century. Carr isn’t afraid to admit that Whitey Bulger, a violent
crime boss who became the FBI’s second-most wanted man after Osama bin Laden, wanted him dead. The book touches on both the highs and lows of his
career, from his run-ins with the FBI to how Sen. Ted Kenne- dy, D-Mass., tried to put the Boston Herald out of business. When it came down to fi guring out exactly what he want-
ed to include in the book, Carr said it wasn’t hard because he “had a lot to write about.” While the book is a refl ection on his career, he said it isn’t
a retirement announcement. Carr writes that he plans to keep his talk show and his
column in the Boston Herald going for as long as he can. The Howie Carr Show airs on Newsmax’s N2 channel weekdays at 6pm ET.
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