Fame
What do William Randolph Hearst, Benjamin Franklin, Tom Wolf, Bob Woodward, Carl Bernstein, and Walter Cronkite have in common? They were all on Celebrity Apprentice at the same time. Just kidding. They were all serious journalists whose work made a huge difference in American culture.
You can become pretty famous as a journalist. If you blow the lid off an embezzlement scheme or a massive government cover-up, or just generally become known as a reliable source of national news, you could go down in history.
Of course, most journalists don't reach the level of fame that would constitute their name being emblazoned on a prize, like Joseph Pulitzer. (Also, he never himself received a Pulitzer—talk about irony.)
So how do you become famous? Use that power we were talking about before: speak the truth to other powerful people and report news stories accurately and reliably. Get the inside scoop.
That's exactly what Woodward and Bernstein (celebrity couple name: Woodbern) were doing as Washington Post journalists, when they investigated a shady break-in at the Democratic Party's headquarters in 1972. Long story very short, their reporting led to the impeachment and resignation of President Richard Nixon in the infamous Watergate scandal.
You know this was the biggest of deals because this thing is the whole reason scandals now all have -gate added to their name—Gamergate, Deflategate, Bridgegate...on and on, ad nauseam.
For those legendary reporters, their driving force was the duty to report a well-researched story. Their journalism abilities led to an event of shocking magnitude—the resignation of the leader of the United States.
They say journalists shouldn't become the news, but, as you might expect, Woodward and Bernstein received quite a bit more attention after that.