For almost 40 years during the mid-twentieth century, Walter Winchell was thought to be the most powerful man in America. A Jewish former vaudevillian, Winchell's power came not from money, family connections, or politics—Winchell was a gossip columnist. Indeed, it has even been said that Winchell invented gossip. Although this is clearly hyperbolic—gossip has always existed in some form—certainly Winchell was the first member of the modern media to both understand its power and know how to wield it. At the height of his influence, more than 50 million Americans, or two thirds of the adult population of the country, either read his daily column or listened to his weekly radio program. His grasp of the potent uses to which gossip could be put changed the face of American culture, and ultimately led to the overweening power held by the media at the...