Bill Lascher 12/7/17 Bill Lascher 12/7/17

Infamy in Manila

Today is the anniversary of the attacks on Pearl Harbor and the Philippines that brought the United States into World War II as a combatant. In Manila, reporters Melville Jacoby, Annalee Whitmore Jacoby, and Carl Mydans sprung into action to cover the conflict. Here's an excerpt from the book Eve of a Hundred Midnights, by Bill Lascher and published by William Morrow, describing their experience of that harrowing first day.

Bill Lascher 2/23/17 Bill Lascher 2/23/17

Into the Blackness Beyond

"We are remembering MacArthur’s men, how hard it was to finally leave, how lucky the three of us are."

Bill Lascher 8/4/16 Bill Lascher 8/4/16

Shanghai Takes it On the Chin

“I hate to see the rich kids in the cabarets, I hate to see the refugees, I hate to see the lousy foreigners in Packards and minks. Lots of money is being made now on the market and in business—but the Chinese peasant is taking it on the proverbial chin.”

Bill Lascher 7/27/16 Bill Lascher 7/27/16

Before and After. Wartime Chongqing as Captured by Melville Jacoby's Lens.

After spending four years with the research, writing and re-writing that shaped Eve of a Hundred Midnights, I feel sometimes as if I've lived in Melville Jacoby's shoes. At least, I feel as if I've seen the world through his eyes. As you can see in the following photos, Chongqing was a place of extensive striving and, after years and years of bombing — during his stints there in 1940 and 1941 Mel experienced 168 air raids — deeply scarred yet incredibly resilient.

Bill Lascher 9/3/15 Bill Lascher 9/3/15

When We Recognize Yesterday In Today

"Chaos has made wanderers out of 15,000,000 people. These people, not only Jews, torn from their homes will soon command the world's attention. For unless an intelligent situation is found, the dire effects of mass migrations will be felt over and over again during the coming centuries. It is hardly up to the refugees themselves. They are so completely befuddled that only happenstance guides their course."

Bill Lascher 1/1/15 Bill Lascher 1/1/15

The Last Night

A new year looms. As it has since I began unfurling this story, New Year's Eve carries a special meaning. As much as I'm thinking about Mel and Annalee, I'm also thinking about the people who left similar impressions upon them, and upon whom they left their own impressions. They are on my mind as I consider how, 73 years ago tonight, Mel and Annalee made the heartbreaking decision to leave their friends at a Manila hotel, run to the city's burning docks and leap aboard the last boat sailing into a dark, mine-strewn harbor before the Japanese entered the Philippines' capital. It was not an easy decision; the people they left behind were their colleagues, their friends, their fellow "soldiers of the press." They were, as I've addressed before, their tribe.

Bill Lascher 4/1/14 Bill Lascher 4/1/14

Paying the Price for a Smoking Gun

By the time I had the confidential State Department documents in my hands, I was five days into my research trip to Washington, D.C., I'd flipped through hundreds, maybe thousands of pages of dusty, sometimes crumbling government documents, private letters from publishing luminaries, and even water-stained diaries from hungry, stranded soldiers unaware of a coming death march through mosquito-infested, sweltering jungles.

Now I need your help to keep looking.

Bill Lascher 11/26/13 Bill Lascher 11/26/13

A Wedding At The Brink of War

For a brief moment after the wedding, the world fell away from Mel and Annalee. That they didn't have the traditional wedding their friends in the Chinese government wanted to throw for them back in Chungking didn't matter. That all their things — including most of Annalee's clothes — were on a ship that would end up diverted from Manila when the war started didn't matter. They were two young reporters in love.

Bill Lascher 8/8/13 Bill Lascher 8/8/13

Mel on the Run

Melville Jacoby on the island of Cebu in the Philippines while he, his wife Annalee, and the A.P.'s Clark Lee were on the run from the Japanese in March, 1942. (apologies for the faded scan).

Bill Lascher 8/7/13 Bill Lascher 8/7/13

Chungking

“Learning to bum cigarettes from visitors, enduring a cold water bath, eating only Chinese food, getting letters home by clipper, settling the world’s problems over rice wine, and watching the Chinese in their tremendous efforts is all part of Chungking’s fun,"

— Melville Jacoby, Summer, 1941