Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Caught in the web of Poverty

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Barbara White Stack is a Post-Gazette staff writer. John Beale is a staff photographer. For the past year, they have been granted an insider’s access to the Kistner family to document the effects of rural poverty.


Barbara White Stack is an issues reporter for the Post-Gazette, focusing on child welfare and delinquency. Before that, she served as an assistant city editor and urban affairs reporter. She joined the newspaper in 1979, after having worked as a reporter for the Beaver County Times and the Greensburg Tribune-Review. A native of Bucks county, Stack is a journalism graduate of Penn State University. She has received numerous awards for her reporting.

John Beale is the chief photographer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Beale, 41, joined the Post-Gazette in 1984. He holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from Indiana University of Pennsylvania. He has won dozens of awards, including top honors in the Pennsylvania Press Photographers Association and Photographer of the Year four times from the News Photographers Association of Greater Pittsburgh. His work has been included in the National Press Photographers Association's ``The Best of Photojournalism.'' Beale was 1997 Regional Photographer of the Year for the National Press Photographers Association, a region covering seven states. He has won first place in the National Press photographers Pictures of the Year competition for one week's work.