Brief Description
The View From Third Street tells the story of a young journalist’s search for love and truth at a time of tumultuous change–just before Watergate.
Written by national journalist Anita M. Harris, The View From Third Street tells of Harris’ post-college adventures in cofounding the Harrisburg Independent Press— an alternative newspaper published in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania throughout the 1970s.
HIP was conceived in conjunction with the Trial of the Harrisburg Seven—in which anti-Vietnam-war nuns and priests were accused of conspiring to kidnap Henry Kissinger and blow up underground heating tunnels in Washington, DC. (True story!)
Like the many other underground and alternative newspapers of the 1960s and 1970s, HIP covered civic, consumer, national and international issues–many with parallels in the unrest we are experiencing today.
In this unconventional memoir, Harris traces, from the point of view of Ani, her 23-year-old self, HIP’s founding, the Harrisburg Seven Trial, and the devastating Flood of 1972, which left 124 people dead. Interwoven, with humor and puzzlement, are stories of Ani’s love relationship, her coverage of poverty and social injustice, and HIP’s reporting on topics ranging from dirty movies to slave labor, heroin sales, racial discrimination, a burgeoning feminist movement, and abortion rights.
The View from Third Street includes rarely seen photos and cartoons from the early 1970’s, including several pages of photos taken during the Flood of 1972.
Harris, who went on to report for Newsday and MacNeil Lehrer (now the NewsHour) of PBS, says she hopes the book will increase understanding of women’s changing roles, journalism, and individuals’ responses to the clashing forces of history. But, mainly, she hopes readers will enjoy the tale.
News Coverage
The Burg: HIP History: Former Harrisburg journalist publishes book about the city in the ’70s, in time for anniversary of historic flood
Press releases
The View From Third Street Now Available on Amazon June 7, 2022
Harrisburg Memoir The View From Third Street to launch in June April 28, 2022
Events
Book Details
The View From Third Street is available in paperback and ebook formats at Amazon $15.99. It may also be ordered via Cambridge Common Press (http://cambridgecommonpress.com) or by contacting anitamharris@comcast.net .
ISBN 979-8-9862002-0-0
283 pages
6 x 0.71 x 9 inches
Photos
Bio of Anita M. Harris
Anita M. Harris is an author, photographer and communications consultant who got her professional start at the Harrisburg Independent Press, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. She later reported for the Boston Phoenix and the Real Paper, in the Boston area, and for Newsday, WRFM Radio, and MacNeil Lehrer (now the NewsHour) of PBS, in New York. After completing a Nieman Fellowship at Harvard, she taught journalism at Harvard, Yale and Simmons Universities. She is the author of Broken Patterns: Professional Women and the Quest for a New Feminine Identity (WSU Press); Ithaca Diaries (Cambridge Common Press); The View From Third Street, and Pandemic Journey, a photobook. She is also the founding director of the Harris Communications Group, in Cambridge, Massachusetts.