Kitty Genovese

About the New York Times Reporter

In his 1964 book on the case, Times' Metropolitan Editor, A.M. Rosenthal, wrote:

     "Gansberg is an old hand at The Times but new at reporting; he had been a copy editor and wanted to try his hand at something different. For weeks afterward, a variety of reporters asked me - more in anger than sorrow - why I had chosen somebody so new and not experienced reporters such as themselves, for instance.
     The reasons were: (a) Gansberg has a sense of enthusiasm, and I knew I wouldn't have to sell him on the story; (b) he is new enough not to resent dogged difficult work that might turn to nothing, as this story might have turned out; and (c) he was within my line of vision."

[A. M. Rosenthal, Thirty-Eight Witnesses: The Kitty Genovese Case., Part 1, p. 15 (Berkeley : Univ. of Calif. Press 1999).  To read the book online, click on the following link and the scroll down to p. 15. Close out window to return here. Click here.]

This article won Martin Gansberg a plaque for excellence from the Newspaper Reporters Association of New York, and a citation from The Silurians, a society of journalists, for best news article of the year. See, "Silurians To Give Reporting Awards", The New York Times, p. 26, col. 3 (April 15, 1965); and "Reporters Group Announces Awards", The New York Times, p. 27, col. 1 (March 24, 1965).

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