Eugene Patterson

Eugene Corbett "Gene" Patterson (October 15, 1923 – January 12, 2013) was an American journalist and civil rights activist. He was awarded the 1967 Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing.

Patterson was born in Valdosta, Georgia, to a bank cashier and a schoolteacher. After the bank at which his father worked was closed in the course of the Great Depression, the family moved to a small farm near Adel, Georgia. The house had no running water or electricity, and was heated only by the fireplace. With his father able to get only occasional employment at local banks, the family was primarily supported by his mother's work as a teacher and her running the farm.

As a teenager, Patterson began to work on weekends at the local journal, the Adel News. He edited a campus newspaper at North Georgia College at Dahlonega, Georgia where he studied for his freshman year. He graduated with a journalism degree from the University of Georgia in 1943. After graduation, he served as a tank commander in the United States Army General George Patton's, 10th Armored Division, 90th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron, First Platoon, C Troop during World War II and won a Silver Star for gallantry in action at the Battle of the Bulge and a Bronze Star with oak leaf cluster for heroic achievement. The 10th Armored, CCB at Bastogne, held off the German Army onslaught for eight hours awaiting the arrival of the 101st Airborne Division to fully stop the offensive. He served as an Army pilot after the war until he left the military to pursue journalism in 1947.

Patterson's first jobs were with the Temple Daily Telegram and the Macon Telegraph. After working for United Press from 1948 to 1956, he was appointed vice president and executive editor of the joint journals, the Atlanta Journal and the Constitution, both now merged into the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

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