Haynes Johnson, a pioneering Washington journalist who won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the civil rights movement and migrated from newspapers to television, books and teaching, has died aged 81.
Johnson, who helped redefine political reporting in addition to appearing on the Public Broadcasting Service and teaching journalism at the University of Maryland, died yesterday at a Washington-area hospital after suffering a heart attack. He had just attended the journalism school's graduation days earlier.
Johnson was awarded a Pulitzer in 1966 for national reporting on the civil rights struggle in Selma, Alabama, while with The Evening Star in Washington. He spent about 12 years at the Star before joining its chief rival, The Washington Post, in 1969. Johnson was a columnist for the Post from 1977 to 1994.
Dan Balz, the Post's senior political reporter, said Johnson was already a legend before they worked together at the newspaper.
"I don't say this lightly. He was a great journalist," Balz yesterday said. "He had everything a good reporter should have, which was a love of going to find the story, a commitment to thorough reporting and then kind of an understanding of history and the importance of giving every story kind of the broadest possible sweep and context."
The author, co-author or editor of 18 books, Johnson also appeared regularly on the Public Broadcasting Service programmes "Washington Week in Review" and "The NewsHour." He was a member of the "NewsHour" historians panel from 1994 to 2004.
"I knew I wanted to write about America, our times, both in journalism and I also wanted to do books," he told C-SPAN in 1991. "I wanted to try to see if I could combine what I do as a newspaper person as well as step back a little bit and write about American life, and I was lucky enough to be able to do that.
