Robert L. Healy (July 2, 1925 – June 5, 2010) was an American journalist. He was born in Boston, Massachusetts.

Career

In the early 1940s, Healy started his career as a copy boy working for ''

The Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...

'' and eventually worked his way up to becoming the executive editor. He worked as an editor from 1969 to 1979. His responsibility included helping with the paper's daily operation. He was also the Washington Bureau Chief of ''The Boston Globe''. Healy was a

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

veteran and covered the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...

. His work landed him on the

master list of Nixon political opponents Master or masters may refer to: Ranks or titles * Ascended master, a term used in the Theosophical religious tradition to refer to spiritually enlightened beings who in past incarnations were ordinary humans * Grandmaster (chess), National Maste ...

. Healy also wrote a column for many years called, Political Circuit. Healy was credited for disarming

Sirhan Sirhan Sirhan Bishara Sirhan (; ar, سرحان بشارة سرحان ''Sirḥān Bišāra Sirḥān'', born March 19, 1944) is a Palestinian Jordanian man who was convicted for the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. Kennedy, a United States Sena ...

with kicking the gun out of his hands shortly after the

assassination of Robert F. Kennedy On June 5, 1968, Robert F. Kennedy was shot by Sirhan Sirhan shortly after midnight at the Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles. He was pronounced dead at 1:44 a.m. PDT the following day. Kennedy was a senator from New York and a candidate ...

. In 1962, Healy nearly ended Edward M. Kennedy's first United States Senate campaign. Healy released information that the candidate was expelled as an undergraduate from Harvard for cheating on an exam.

Awards and honors

Healy was a part of a team with ''The Boston Globe'' that won its first Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. They won the prize from their work on the

Boston Municipal Court The Boston Municipal Court (BMC), officially the Boston Municipal Court Department of the Trial Court, is a department of the Trial Court of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, United States. The court hears criminal, civil, mental health, rest ...

Judge

Francis X. Morrissey Francis Xavier Morrissey (May 21, 1910 – December 27, 2007) was a Massachusetts attorney who served as a judge on the Boston Municipal Court from 1958 to 1980. Morrissey was John F. Kennedy's secretary when Kennedy served as a congressman ...

's nomination to federal bench.

Family

Healy's father worked for ''The Boston Globe'' for over 50 years as a mailer. Healy was married to Janet Rush and they had 8 children and 17 grandchildren. However that marriage ended in a divorce,. He later wed Mary Healy and they were married for 32 years.

Death

Healy died from a stroke on June 5, 2010, at his home in Jupiter,

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 ...

. He was 84.

References

Sources

*Staff report (June 19, 1996)
Interview with Robert Healy
'' Frontline'' 1925 births 2010 deaths American male journalists 20th-century American journalists {{US-journalist-1920s-stub