Veteran Reporter Dies in Crash

From the very beginning, David L. Halberstam ’55 seemed destined for a career in journalism. Elected a news editor for The Crimson his freshman year, Halberstam rose through the ranks to garner the position of managing editor his junior year. It was his tireless devotion to the paper—sometimes even at the expense of his grades—and his endless enthusiasm that set him apart to those who knew him.

“He was just raw energy, you just saw the man in constant motion. I picture him at one or two in the morning looking over the last proofs of the paper before they went to print,” said Arthur J. Langguth, Jr. ’55, who was president of The Crimson when Halberstam was managing editor. “He was such a newsman that if it came to a choice between giving the paper all he had and keeping up with his work in his classes, his coursework would suffer.”

And through his long and distinguished career as a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of over twenty books on subjects that varied from baseball to war, Halberstam never lost that passion and drive for journalism—a passion for which he will be revered.

Halberstam was killed in a car crash south of San Francisco yesterday while riding in the passenger seat to conduct an interview for his new book. He was pronounced dead at the scene, according to San Mateo County Coroner Robert J. Foucrault. He was 73.

“It’s obvious that he was probably the greatest journalist of his generation. He had a core integrity that gave him credibility and power, whether he was writing about basketball or Vietnam it carried an enormous amount of weight,” said Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist J. Anthony Lewis ’48, a former Crimson managing editor. “He was a sweet man—loyal, kind, thoughtful. I just didn’t know anybody who is a better representation of journalism.”

Born April 10, 1934 in the Bronx, N.Y., Halberstam followed his brother Michael to Harvard in 1951 and joined the paper that year, soon proving himself to be an intrepid and astute journalist.

“Every two weeks we would meet with the president of Harvard and it was always David who asked the penetrating questions. He wouldn’t let the administration off the hook when there was some evidence that things weren’t going as they should,” Langguth said.

And even as an undergraduate, Halberstam’s interests could not be confined to any one subject. He wrote stories on a broad variety of topics from the Emmett Till case to Harvard football matches.

Described as “ferocious,” Halberstam soon become “the spine of the newspaper” the year he was managing editor, according to Langguth. And even after his tenure came to an end, “he was one of those people who couldn’t stay away,” said former New York Times reporter Adam Clymer ’58.

Upon graduation, Halberstam accepted a low-paying job as a staff writer for the Daily Times Leader in Mississippi and left Harvard to journey to the South to cover race relations.

“For our class, going into journalism was a little unusual but it didn’t surprise us that David did,” Phillip M. Cronin ’53, a former president of The Crimson, said.

Halberstam’s time with the Times Leader ended abruptly when he was fired for his coverage of the Civil Rights movement after only one year, according to his wife, Jean Halberstam. He went on to work at the Nashville Tennessean, a job which his wife said he loved.

Halberstam eventually left The Tennessean to take a job with The New York Times. After serving as a foreign correspondent in Africa, Halberstam was sent to Vietnam to cover the ongoing conflict, making him one of the first full-time Western newspaper journalists working in the country. His coverage of the war and the overthrow of the Diem government won him the 1964 Pulitzer Prize for international reporting. But this coverage also drew death threats from those opposed to his unflattering depictions of American involvement in Vietnam.

“He wrote very important news stories out of Vietnam showing some of the frustration and failures of military operations,” said George S. Abrams ’54, who served as managing editor of The Crimson the year before Halberstam.

“He angered President Kennedy, who asked the New York Times to change his assignment and move him out of Vietnam,” Abrams said. “But The Times continued to let him cover Vietnam.”

From his experiences during the war, Halberstam wrote what is considered one of his greatest works, “The Best and the Brightest.” More than twenty books followed, with his most recent, “The Coldest Winter,” a book about the Korean war, due out this upcoming fall. Halberstam had just finished the last proofs of this book before yesterday’s car crash, according to his wife.

“He certainly was one of the greatest writers of 20th century,” Cronin said, “and I can say that because I have read everything that he has ever written.”

—Evan H. Jacobs and Kristina M. Moore contributed to the reporting of this story.

—Staff writer Jamison A. Hill can be reached at jahill@fas.harvard.edu.

FOR MORE INFO: Please see an online extra of Halberstam's work at The Crimson.