Barlett & Steele to receive SABEW distinguished achievement award

Donald Barlett and James Steele, two highly acclaimed investigative journalists, will be honored for distinguished achievement at the 48th annual national conference of the Society of American Business Editors and Writers

The two have worked together for more than three decades, first at The Philadelphia Inquirer (1971-1997), where they won two Pulitzer Prizes and numerous national journalism awards, then at Time magazine (1997-2006), where they earned two National Magazine Awards. They now write for Vanity Fair magazine as contributing editors. They also have written seven books.

Their 1992 Inquirer series, “America: What Went Wrong?” was named by the New York University School of Journalism as one of the 100 best pieces of journalism of the 20th century. Rewritten as a book, it became a No. 1 New York Times bestseller. It is one of the seven books Barlett and Steele have published.

Former SABEW President Greg McCune, an editor at Reuters America, said that Barlett and Steele were chosen because of their outstanding body of work.

“Investigative reporting teams have been reduced across the country in the media transformation and we wanted to remind the media community how important it is to have beacons of good, hard-hitting investigative journalism such as Barlett and Steele,” McCune said. “Their work as a team over nearly four decades has been truly outstanding and richly deserves this recognition.”

The Distinguished Achievement Award winner is chosen by a committee of the three most recent past presidents of SABEW, the vice president of the organization and one at-large member chosen from the SABEW board. The committee included past presidents McCune, Gail DeGeorge and Bernie Kohn, vice president Kevin Noblet and board member Ray Hennessey.

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