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With several honors and awards given during her career, she also was one of the first [[reporters]] to reveal that the ''[[Mafia]]'' was an organized crime network.<ref name="WW1" />
With several honors and awards given during her career, she also was one of the first [[reporters]] to reveal that the ''[[Mafia]]'' was an organized crime network.<ref name="WW1" />

== Biography ==
Borned in Washington D.C. on October 7, 1914 Miriam Ottenberg's father was Louis Ottenberg, an attorney; her mother, Nettie Podell Ottenberg (1887–1982), a Russian emigree, was an active woman suffragist known as "Mrs. Day Care" for her efforts on behalf of better child care services. Miriam had two sibilings, Regina Ottenberg Greenhill and one brother, Louis Ottenberg, Jr.<ref name=archival>{{cite web|title=Miriam Ottenberg Papers, 1931–1982|url=http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi/f/findaid/findaid-idx?c=wiarchives;view=reslist;subview=standard;didno=uw-whs-mss00748;focusrgn=bioghist;cc=wiarchives;byte=208691655|website=Archival Resources in Wisconsin: Descriptive Finding Aids University of Wisconsin Digital Collections}}</ref>

Miriam Ottenberg graduated from Central High School in Washington, D.C. in 1931, and attended Goucher College, Columbia University, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, from which she graduated with a BA in journalism in 1935 while writing for the student newspaper, The Daily Cardinal.<ref name=wp>{{cite news|title=Miriam Ottenberg|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1982/11/11/miriam-ottenberg/799db2d9-6164-4177-92a6-8ef776691e1f/|agency=Washington Post|date=November 11, 1982}}</ref>

After graduating she worked as a [[copywriter]] for a Chicago [[advertising agency]], Neisser-Meyerhoff (1935–36) and as a reporter for the women's department of the ''Akron (Ohio) Times''.

In 1937 she started working at the ''[[Washington Star]]'' covering public service and charity campaigns being the first woman news reporter at the Star, where previously other women only had written primarily for the woman's page.

By the beginning of World War II, she was covering all the major murder stories in the city and also covered the draft, civil defense, and mobilization during the war.

In 1947, Ottenberg began specializing in investigative crime reporting, eventually becoming a noted pioneer in the field. Her first professional recognition came in 1953, when she was named co-winner of the Washington Newspaper Guild competition for public service articles.<ref name=ec>{{cite news|last1=Carper|first1=Elsie|title=Reporter Miriam Ottenberg of the Washington Star Dies|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1982/11/10/reporter-miriam-ottenberg-of-the-washington-star-dies/55ff6cb8-0f2f-4711-b309-011815ea381c/|agency=The Washington Post|date=November 10, 1982}}</ref>

In 1960 Ottenberg won the [[Pulitzer Prize]] for her series on used car fraud, "Buyer Beware." Thereafter she became known as the "Beware Girl" for her continued investigations of consumer fraud. Her award-winning series included "Homeowners Beware," “Investors Beware," “Traveler Beware," and a series on local stock market abuses.<ref name= archival />

In 1967 she exposed debt-consolidating firms in her series, "Debtor Beware." In order to collect information for numerous stories, Ottenberg often donned disguises. The first incidence of this occurred when, in order to expose an adoption racket, she and a fellow reporter posed as a married couple seeking to adopt a child.

From 1966 to 1968, Miriam Ottenberg served as an editor of the first regular newspaper section that investigated consumer complaints, known as "Action Line".

In 1962 Miriam published ''[[The Federal Prosecutors]]'' (Prentice-Hall), a book about the FBI in which she worked with the Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, with whom she had developed a working relationship and respect after years of reporting the activities of the Department of Justice. Ottenberg was also one of the first reporters to reveal that the "[[Mafia]]" was an organized crime network. Her 1963 story on [[Joe Valachi]], the mobster who subsequently blew the whistle on the Mafia, presented a new view of organized crime in America.<ref name=ed>{{cite book|last1=Cray|first1=Ed|title=Chief Justice: A Biography of Earl Warren|date=1997|publisher=Simon and Schuster,|isbn=9780684808529|pages=603}}</ref>

Ottenberg retired in 1974 due to vision problems and [[multiple sclerosis]]. (Ottenberg had contracted MS in 1944 at the age of 30, although it was not diagnosed until 1967 or revealed to her until 1971.) During her retirement she began extensively investigating the disease, writing articles on the subject and also doing gathering information and individual accounts with the disease. From this she wrote her second book, ''[[The Pursuit of Hope]]'' (Rawson, Wade Pub.) in 1978.<ref name=pp>{{cite book|last1=Gruyter|first1=Walter|title=The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award Winning Materials in Journalism, Letters and Arts, Volume 6|publisher=Heinz-Dietrich Fischer|isbn=9783598301704|pages=420 pages|edition=Heinz-Dietrich Fischer}}</ref>

On June 10, 1981, Ottenberg enlisted the Washington Hall of Fame of the [[Society of Professional Journalists]], Sigma Delta Chi. And the Star print.


== Books published ==
== Books published ==

Revision as of 21:53, 7 January 2016

Miriam Ottenberg (October 7, 1914 in Washington, D.C. – November 10, 1982) was the first woman news reporter for The Washington Star who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1960, for a series of articles exposing the practices of unscrupulous used car dealers in Washington D.C. Her follow-up stories led to enactment of remedial law.[1]

With several honors and awards given during her career, she also was one of the first reporters to reveal that the Mafia was an organized crime network.[1]

Books published

  • "The Warren commission report: the assassination of president Kennedy " Miriam Ottenberg
  • "The Pursuit of Hope" Ottenberg, Miriam ISBN 9780892560691
  • "The Federal Prosecutors (Prentice-Hall), a book about the FBI(1962)"

Honorable mention awards

  • Co-winner of the Washington Newspaper Guild competition for public service articles in 1953.
  • Honorable mention awards in the same category in 1954 and 1958, and in 1959.
  • Pulitzer Prize in 1960 for best investigation report: “Buyer Beware”.
  • Bill Pryor Award of the Washington Newspaper Guild for her series on used car fraud, “Buyer Beware.”
  • First place in the local news category for her stories on an abortion ring and on murders of women.
  • In May 1958, capital police, jurists, and local and federal government officials held a party to pay tribute to Ottenberg's efforts against crime.
  • She was given awards for distinction by the National Council of Jewish Women in 1963 and by the American Association of University Women in 1975.
  • In 1979 she won the Hope Chest Award from the National Capital Chapter of the National MS Society.

References

  1. ^ a b Elizabeth A. Brennan, Elizabeth C. Clarage, eds., Who's who of Pulitzer Prize Winners (Greenwood Publishing Group, 1999), ISBN 978-1573561112, p. 356. Excerpts available at Google Books.
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