Gene Miller (1928–2005) was a longtime investigative reporter at the ''
Miami Herald
The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by the McClatchy Company and headquartered in Doral, Florida, a List of communities in Miami-Dade County, Florida, city in western Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade County and the M ...
'' who won two
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made h ...
s for reporting that helped save innocent men on
Florida
Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...
's Death Row from execution. He was also a legendary editor, mentoring generations of young reporters in how to write crisp, direct, and entertaining stories. When he died of cancer in 2005, the Herald called him "the soul and the conscience of our newsroom."
Life
Miller was born in
Evansville, Indiana
Evansville is a city in, and the county seat of, Vanderburgh County, Indiana, United States. The population was 118,414 at the 2020 census, making it the state's third-most populous city after Indianapolis and Fort Wayne, the largest city in ...
, United States, on September 16, 1928. He earned a B.A. in journalism from
Indiana University
Indiana University (IU) is a system of public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana.
Campuses
Indiana University has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration of IUPUI.
*Indiana Universit ...
in 1950, then took a job at the ''
Journal Gazette
''The Journal Gazette'' is the morning newspaper in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It publishes seven days a week, and contends for circulation and advertising in a 15-county area.
History
''The Journal Gazette'' traces its origins to 1863 when ''The For ...
'' in
Fort Wayne, Indiana
Fort Wayne is a city in and the county seat of Allen County, Indiana, United States. Located in northeastern Indiana, the city is west of the Ohio border and south of the Michigan border. The city's population was 263,886 as of the 2020 Censu ...
. The following year, he joined the Army during the
Korean War
, date = {{Ubl, 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (''de facto'')({{Age in years, months, weeks and days, month1=6, day1=25, year1=1950, month2=7, day2=27, year2=1953), 25 June 1950 – present (''de jure'')({{Age in years, months, weeks a ...
, serving until 1953.
After leaving the Army, Miller then reported briefly for the ''
Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' in 1954 and the ''News Leader'' in
Richmond, Virginia
(Thus do we reach the stars)
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, map_caption = Location within Virginia
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from 1954 to 1957. That year, he was hired by the ''Miami Herald'', where he would work the rest of his life.
In 1952, he married Electra Yphantis (1923–1993), with whom he had four children. In 1998, five years after becoming a widower, he married Caroline Heck, a federal prosecutor.
He wrote two nonfiction books: ''83 Hours Till Dawn'', an account of a notorious Florida kidnapping in which the victim,
Barbara Jane Mackle
The 1968 kidnapping of Barbara Jane Mackle was the subject of an autobiographical book which was the basis of two television movies.
Background
Barbara Jane Mackle, aged 20 at the time of her kidnapping, was the daughter of Robert Mackle, a we ...
, was buried alive, and ''Invitation to a Lynching''.
Pulitzer Prizes
Over the decades Miller would cover or edit coverage for a wide swath of historic stories, but it was his investigation of four flawed murder convictions that established his legacy. His efforts twice won him a Pulitzer.
Miller won the first Pulitzer in 1967 for separate investigations into the cases of Joe Shea and Mary Katherin Hampton, each innocent people who had been falsely convicted of murder who were freed thanks to his reporting.
In 1976, Miller won again after writings stories that freed two black Death Row inmates, Freddie Pitts and Wilbert Lee, who had been condemned to die in 1963 for the murders of two white gas station attendants in
Port St. Joe, Florida. They had nothing to do with the crime, but police had beaten false confessions from them.
After learning that a third man had confessed to the crime, Miller spent eight years writing stories about the case and then wrote a book about it, "Invitation to a Lynching." In 1975, Miller sent the galleys to his book to then-Florida attorney general Robert Shevin and then-Florida Governor
Reubin Askew
Reubin O'Donovan Askew (September 11, 1928 – March 13, 2014) was an American politician, who served as the 37th governor of Florida from 1971 to 1979. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the 7th U.S. Trade representative from 1979 ...
. Askew granted the men clemency. Miller's suddenly obsolete book was a bomb, but he said he didn't care - he had written it for only one reader, Askew.
Miller, who left a vivid and stylishly choppy imprint on the stories he edited,
was the editor for two more Pulitzer wins at the ''Miami Herald'': Edna Buchanan in 1986 and Sydney Freedberg in 1991.
See also
*''
Miller v. Universal City Studios, Inc.
''Miller v. Universal City Studios, Inc.'' is a case where an appeals court found that although the plaintiff apparently deserved to prevail, it reversed the jury verdict and remanded the case for retrial because it found reversible error in the ...
''
References
External links
Obituary ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
''.
"Gene Miller, Pulitzer-winning journalist, dies
{{DEFAULTSORT:Miller, Gene
American male journalists
20th-century American journalists
1928 births
2005 deaths
Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting winners
Writers from Evansville, Indiana
Deaths from cancer in Florida
Miami Herald people