
Don Whitehead was an American journalist. Among his many awards were the Medal of Freedom, the 1950 George Polk Award for wire service reporting, the 1951 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting, and the 1952 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting. He studied at University of Kentucky from 1926 to 1928.He worked for the newspapers Lafollette Press (Harlan, Kentucky), and the Daily Enterprise beginning in 1928 where he covered the Harlan County War. He became a reporter for the Associated Press, in 1935. Whitehead was a combat reporter during World War II.He covered the Eighth Army (United Kingdom) in Egypt, for the AP in September 1942 and then the American Army in Algeria and Tunisia in 1943. He covered the Allied invasion of Sicily in July 1943 with the First Infantry Division. In addition he reported on the Allied invasion of Italy at Salerno in September 1943, the bloody Italian campaign in the fall of that year and the Anzio landings in January 1944. Don Whitehead was on Omaha Beach with the 116th Infantry Regiment on June 6th, 1944 and was present for the Liberation of Paris and the first meeting of American and Russian forces on the Elbe River in May, 1945. All total Don Whitehead made five amphibious landings with assault forces during World War II. He received his first Pulitzer Prize, for international reporting (1951), for his coverage of the early months of the Korean War - where he again experienced months of front line combat. He received his second Pulitzer, for national reporting, in 1953 for his coverage of President Eisenhower's post-election trip to South Korea in 1953. He was Washington bureau chief for the New York Herald Tribune, from 1956 - 1957 and later a columnist for the The Knoxville (Tennessee) News-Sentinel. His book, The FBI Story was adapted into a 1959 film starring James M. Stewart, aka: Jimmy Stewart. His papers are held at the University of Tennessee. Don Whitehead married Marie Patterson on December 20, 1928. They had a daughter, Ruth, and two grandchildren.