SOURCE: "This is Ernie Pyle's War," in The New Republic, Vol. III, No. 24, December 11, 1944, pp. 804-06.

In the following essay, Hovey attempts, through a review of Brave Men, to explain why Pyle was the most popular war correspondent in America during World War II.

Like Franklin Roosevelt and the Brooklyn Dodgers, Ernie Pyle is the people's choice. They elected him their favorite war correspondent for the duration shortly after Americans first began to fight Germans in this war, and his popularity has steadily increased. The explanation, I think, is simple: Ernie Pyle consistently has contributed the best job of reporting and writing about the Americans who have to fight the war. Pyle's popularity puzzles our British friends, who concern themselves more with articles on strategy and the political aspects of the conflict. But Americans have been most interested in the human side, and that side is Ernie Pyle's...