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Geneva Overholser4th Annual John S. Knight Lecturer
Geneva Overholser was born in South Carolina, graduated from high school in North Carolina, and earned a bachelor's degree in history at Wellesley College. In addition to her degree from Wellesley, she has a master's degree in journalism from Northwestern University. Ms. Overholser began her journalistic career in Colorado as a reporter with the Colorado Springs Sun, and then spent five years working as a freelancer in Africa and in Europe. In 1981, she joined the Des Moines Register as an editorial writer. In 1985, she was awarded a Nieman Fellowship at Harvard University, after which she took a job at the New York Times as an editorial writer specializing in foreign affairs and security issues. She returned to the Des Moines Register as its editor in 1988. Under the editorship of Ms. Overholser the Register won the 1991 Pulitzer Prize Gold Metal for Public Service for "It Couldn't Happen To Me: One Woman's Story," a series of articles about the rape of an Iowa woman that used the woman's name and photograph. The series of articles resulted from a powerful essay Ms. Overholser wrote, arguing that the press needed to reconsider the way it covered rape cases. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the American Society of Newspaper Editors and of the Pulitzer Prize Board. She was named the 1990 Editor of the Year by the Gannett Company, which owns the Register. |
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