Voices of Truth
And our Uncle Walter is gone too. He was another voice that told the truth. He had a strong connection to Ireland from the time he was based in Derry, Base One Europe, as a war correspondent during WWII. Because of his good memories of that time he agreed to appear in the documentary I did for PBS stations about the 300,000 American troops stationed in Northern Ireland during the War when Maebeth Fenton, a friend of the Cronkites and a great supporter of Northern Ireland, asked him. After the shoot he told me how Irish men from the Free State would wait at the Border to invite the Americans to step across to Donegal for feeds of fresh eggs, butter and poitin. "One fellow offered us raincoats to put on. He said that if our uniforms were covered and we took off our caps than weren't we civilians temporarily and able to ignore Army rules against going into neutral Ireland?" Walter Cronkite didn't tell me he went across but he didn't say he hadn't. I know through the years he sailed around the coast of Northern Ireland many times.
Another journalist I knew much better left us this Sunday too. David Sutton grew up on Chicago's North Shore, the son of a Dean of Northwestern University. His path was clear yet he choose to enlist in the Army, finding another America in southern Army camps and then a surrogate Korean family when he was stationed there. They remained his life-long friends. He was an excellent reporter, editor and photographer and had the kind of long, rewarding career at The Chicago Tribune that doesn't seem possible in newspapers today and is more precious because of that. David shared journalism and everything else with his wife Barbara, a quiet trail blazer for women at the paper, and...well, we've been friends since we were 10 and I can't fit how great she is into the longest blog. Friends and family are gathering to be with her and remember David. So with Frank McCourt and Walter Cronkite. Surely the three will be at the gatherings -- three good men each who knew a good story and how to tell it. Eternal light shine upon them. May they rest in peace.
Another journalist I knew much better left us this Sunday too. David Sutton grew up on Chicago's North Shore, the son of a Dean of Northwestern University. His path was clear yet he choose to enlist in the Army, finding another America in southern Army camps and then a surrogate Korean family when he was stationed there. They remained his life-long friends. He was an excellent reporter, editor and photographer and had the kind of long, rewarding career at The Chicago Tribune that doesn't seem possible in newspapers today and is more precious because of that. David shared journalism and everything else with his wife Barbara, a quiet trail blazer for women at the paper, and...well, we've been friends since we were 10 and I can't fit how great she is into the longest blog. Friends and family are gathering to be with her and remember David. So with Frank McCourt and Walter Cronkite. Surely the three will be at the gatherings -- three good men each who knew a good story and how to tell it. Eternal light shine upon them. May they rest in peace.
posted by Mary Pat Kelly at
6:40 AM
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