Helen Thomas in White House Press Room on her 89th birthday in 2009 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Longtime White House press correspondent, Helen Thomas passed away after a long illness on Saturday, July 20, 2013. She was 92. Ms. Thomas began covering the White House in 1961, and was on that beat until her retirement in 2010. She was a fixture at all White House press conferences, usually seated front and center from the podium. Her tenure of service saw her cover 10 presidents, from Kennedy up to, and including President Obama. Of all the presidents, Ms. Thomas said that President George W. Bush was “the worst president ever.” Thomas was the first female president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, as well as a longtime mentor to other aspiring female journalists. Her style of interrogation was often very blunt and to-the-point, regardless of the party affiliation of any of the sitting presidents that she covered. Her funeral will be held in Detroit, where she was raised.
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- VIDEO: US journalist Helen Thomas dies (bbc.co.uk)
