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Georgie Anne Geyer (April 2, 1935 – May 15, 2019)
was an American journalist who covered the world as a foreign correspondent for the Chicago Daily News and then became a syndicated columnist for the
Universal Press Syndicate
Universal Press Syndicate (UPS), a subsidiary of Andrews McMeel Universal, was an independent press syndicate. It distributed lifestyle and opinion columns, comic strips and other content. Popular columns include Dear Abby, Ann Coulter, Roger Eb ...
. Her columns focused on
foreign affairs
''Foreign Affairs'' is an American magazine of international relations and U.S. foreign policy published by the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonprofit, nonpartisan, membership organization and think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and ...
issues and appeared in approximately 120 newspapers in
North
North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography.
Etymology
T ...
and
South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...
. She was the author of ten books, including a
biography
A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just the basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or ...
of
Fidel Castro
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz (; ; 13 August 1926 – 25 November 2016) was a Cuban revolutionary and politician who was the leader of Cuba from 1959 to 2008, serving as the prime minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976 and president from 1976 to 200 ...
and a memoir of her life as a foreign correspondent, ''Buying the Night Flight''.
Early life and education
Geyer was born in
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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, and graduated from Calumet High School. She graduated from the
Medill School of Journalism at
Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world.
Charte ...
in 1956, where she was a member of
Alpha Chi Omega sorority. She attended the
University of Vienna
The University of Vienna (german: Universität Wien) is a public research university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world. With its long and rich histor ...
on a
Fulbright Scholarship
The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright–Hays Program, is one of several United States Cultural Exchange Programs with the goal of improving intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the people of ...
. She spoke
Spanish,
Portuguese,
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ger ...
, and
Russian.
Professional career
Her first job was with the Chicago ''
Southtown Economist
The ''Daily Southtown'' (formerly ''SouthtownStar'') is a newspaper of the Chicago, Illinois, United States metropolitan area that covers the south suburbs and the South Side neighborhoods of the city – a wide region known as the Chicago ...
''. From 1959 to 1974, Geyer was a reporter for the now-defunct ''
Chicago Daily News
The ''Chicago Daily News'' was an afternoon daily newspaper in the midwestern United States, published between 1875 and 1978 in Chicago, Illinois.
History
The ''Daily News'' was founded by Melville E. Stone, Percy Meggy, and William Dougherty ...
'', where she worked from society reporting to the news desk and eventually foreign correspondent. After leaving the paper, she began her syndicated column.
In 1973, she was the first Western reporter to interview
Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein ( ; ar, صدام حسين, Ṣaddām Ḥusayn; 28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003. A leading member of the revolution ...
, then Vice President of Iraq. She also interviewed
Yasser Arafat,
Anwar Sadat
Muhammad Anwar el-Sadat, (25 December 1918 – 6 October 1981) was an Egyptian politician and military officer who served as the third president of Egypt, from 15 October 1970 until his assassination by fundamentalist army officers on 6 ...
,
King Hussein of
Jordan
Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...
,
Muammar al-Gaddafi
Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi, . Due to the lack of standardization of transcribing written and regionally pronounced Arabic, Gaddafi's name has been romanized in various ways. A 1986 column by ''The Straight Dope'' lists 32 spellin ...
, and the
Ayatollah Khomeini
Ruhollah Khomeini, Ayatollah Khomeini, Imam Khomeini ( , ; ; 17 May 1900 – 3 June 1989) was an Iranian political and religious leader who served as the first supreme leader of Iran from 1979 until his death in 1989. He was the founder of ...
. She reported on rebels in the
Dominican Republic
The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares wit ...
, was held by authorities in
Angola
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for her reporting during civil war, and was threatened with death by the
Mano Blanca
(Spanish, 'White Hand'), was a Guatemalan right-wing, anti-communist death squad, set up in 1966 to prevent Julio César Méndez Montenegro from being inaugurated as the president of Guatemala. While initially autonomous from the government, i ...
death squads in
Guatemala
Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by H ...
.
Geyer had more than 21 honorary degrees, including three from Northwestern alone.
In an October 1996 letter published in the ''
Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...
'', now Judge
Ramon Ocasio III criticized Geyer for
anti-immigrant and anti-Hispanic rhetoric in her Op-ed "The anti-Columbus Day march."
Personal life and death
In 1992, the CBS sitcom ''
Hearts Afire'' thinly based its lead female character, Georgie Anne Lahti, on Geyer's life and career. In January 1993, ''
Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...
'' columnist
Mike Royko
Michael Royko Jr. (September 19, 1932 – April 29, 1997) was an American newspaper columnist from Chicago. Over his 30-year career, he wrote over 7,500 daily columns for the ''Chicago Daily News'', the ''Chicago Sun-Times'', and the ''Chicago ...
excoriated the show's producers for doing so, and stated that Geyer was not pleased with that depiction. "Did the TV producers ask if they could use the real Georgie Anne that way?" Royko wrote. "Not only did they not ask, they loftily deny that their TV Georgie Anne is in any way based on the real life Georgie Anne. A mere coincidence, yuck, yuck. Not to butter you up, but most of my readers are logical. So let me pose this question: If you were a Chicago-born blond named Georgie Anne, had built an international reputation as a foreign correspondent and columnist, and had written an important book about Fidel Castro, and you turned on your TV and saw a lewd sitcom about a Chicago-born blond named Georgie Anne who built a national reputation as a foreign correspondent and had written an important book about Fidel Castro, wouldn't you say something like: 'Hey, what the hell's going on?'"
Geyer developed cancer of the tongue more than a decade before her death. She died at her home in Washington, D.C. on May 15, 2019.
Books
*''Americans No More''
*''Buying the Night Flight: the Autobiography of a Woman Foreign Correspondent''
*''When Cats Reigned Like Kings: On the Trail of the Sacred Cats''
*''Guerrilla Prince'' (biography of
Fidel Castro
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz (; ; 13 August 1926 – 25 November 2016) was a Cuban revolutionary and politician who was the leader of Cuba from 1959 to 2008, serving as the prime minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976 and president from 1976 to 200 ...
)
*''Waiting for Winter to End (an extraordinary journey through Soviet Central Asia)''
References
External links
Biographyat Universal Press Syndicate site
from Northwestern University
from the Chicago Headline Club
Reagan Mondale debate October 21, 1984on Wikimedia Commons
*
''Booknotes'' interview with Geyer on ''Guerrilla Prince'', March 10, 1991.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Geyer, Georgie Anne
1935 births
2019 deaths
Women war correspondents
Maria Moors Cabot Prize winners
Medill School of Journalism alumni
University of Vienna alumni
Writers from Chicago
Journalists from Illinois
American war correspondents
American women journalists
21st-century American women
Fulbright alumni