Frances Lewine
Lewine with President Richard Nixon and Helen Thomas in 1973
Born(1921-01-20)January 20, 1921
New York City
DiedJanuary 19, 2008(2008-01-19) (aged 86)
EducationHunter College
OccupationJournalist
Notable credit(s)AP, CNN

Frances Lewine (January 20, 1921 – January 19, 2008) was an American journalist and White House Correspondent.[1]

Biography

Lewine was born January 20, 1921, in Far Rockaway, Queens. She and her brother spent much of their childhood there in an extended family household which included their first cousins Richard Feynman and Joan Feynman.[2][3]

Lewine attended Hunter College, where she edited the college newspaper. She worked for the Courier-News in Plainfield, New Jersey before joining the Associated Press's New Jersey bureau.[4]

She joined the Associated Press White House press corps in 1956, "when another woman had reached 55 and had to retire."[5] In March 1962, she traveled with the Kennedys as part of the press contingent on their world tour.[6]

After the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) determined that AP was violating the 1964 Civil Rights Act (only 7% of the AP's reporters were women in 1973), Lewine together with Shirley Christian and five other women reporters filed a complaint with the EEOC.[6][7] By the time the case was settled in the women's favor in 1983, the seven plaintiffs shared a payout of $83,120 out of AP's $2 million settlement, which also included back pay for other Black and women journalists at AP.[6]

Lewine was also active in the struggle to persuade the National Press Club and the Gridiron Club to open their membership to women reporters. Women were finally admitted to the Press Club starting in 1971; when the Gridiron Club started admitting women in 1975, Lewine and Helen Thomas were the first two women members.[5]

In 1976, Lewine asked President Gerald Ford a two-part question that was later described by Ford's Press Secretary Ron Nessen as "the worst misuse of a question at a presidential news conference to advocate a personal point of view."[8] The Journalism and Women Symposium described her question as follows:[5]

...she asked President Gerald Ford at a televised news conference whether he agreed with the administration's guidelines urging federal officials not to patronize segregated facilities. Ford said he did. Then Fran asked him why he played golf every week at Burning Tree Country Club, which still refused to admit women at that time.

Ford treated the question as a joke, and quickly moved on to another reporter, but the White House and Lewine's editors at AP were angry. Lewine speculated that AP took her off their White House team because of that question.[8][9]

In 1977, after covering the administrations of six presidents, Lewine left the AP, taking a job in Jimmy Carter's administration as the deputy director of public affairs for the Transportation Department. In 1981, she joined CNN as a field producer and assignment editor.[4]

Lewine was president of the Women's National Press Club and advocated for equality for women journalists. She expressed disappointment in her own assignments at the White House, where she reported on social events and stories about the first family, noting that she was not allowed to cover the president as were her male colleagues.[4]

She died in January 2008 of an apparent stroke.[1]

References

  1. 1 2 Frances Lewine, trailblazing journalist, dies
  2. ↑ McKinley, Erin (January 25, 2008). "Famous Female Journalist Dies". The Wave. Retrieved January 15, 2022. Born in Rockaway and a graduate of Rockaway schools, she was part of an extended family that included her first cousin, Richard Feynman, who worked on the "Manhattan Project" that produced the first atomic bomb, and who later received the Nobel Prize in Physics.
  3. ↑ Feynman, Richard P. (1985). Ralph Leighton (ed.). Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!: Adventures of a Curious Character. W. W. Norton & Co. ISBN 0-393-01921-7. OCLC 10925248. We lived at that time in a big house; it was left by my grandfather to his children, and they didn't have much money aside from the house...One day my cousin Frances and I sat Joan down and said that there was a special program she should listen to. Then we ran upstairs and we started to broadcast...
  4. 1 2 3 "Frances Lewine Obituary". AP. 2008. Retrieved September 18, 2022. She was also a member of Executive Women in Government and the Society of Professional Journalists. She was elected to the Washington Society of Professional Journalists Hall of Fame and to the Hunter College Hall of Fame, and was awarded the Missouri Honor Medal for Distinguished Service in Journalism last October.
  5. 1 2 3 "In Memoriam: Frances Lewine, 1921-2008". Journalism and Women Symposium. March 12, 2010. Retrieved November 7, 2021. For example, she angered the White House press office — and even some of her editors — when she asked President Gerald Ford at a televised news conference whether he agreed with the administration's guidelines urging federal officials not to patronize segregated facilities. Ford said he did. Then Fran asked him why he played golf every week at Burning Tree Country Club, which still refused to admit women at that time.
  6. 1 2 3 Waggoner, Martha (June 27, 2019). "30-plus years before #MeToo, 7 women sued the AP for gender discrimination — and won". Poynter. Retrieved November 7, 2021. Frances Lewine ... was a member of the press contingent that covered Kennedy's world tour in March 1962.
  7. ↑ Christian, Shirley (October 15, 2012). "Good Girls Don't". Nieman Reports. Retrieved November 7, 2021. By the time we settled in 1983, women had increased to 22 percent of the domestic news staff, up from 7 percent in 1973, and those in foreign assignments had grown proportionately. All of the named plaintiffs had departed for other jobs, and I had been graciously congratulated in a New York courtroom by one of the AP's mega-priced attorneys for winning the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting for The Miami Herald.
  8. 1 2 "1979: Covering the Women's Movement". Nieman Reports. 1979. Retrieved November 7, 2021. Ford answered with a caustic quip about golfing and quickly took another question. According to desk editors at the AP, the New York executives were upset that the question was even asked. Ms. Lewine says her subsequent removal from the AP's White House staff may have dated back to that query.
  9. ↑ "Gerald Ford's 28th Press Conference 2-17-1976". Historical Voices. February 17, 1976. Retrieved November 7, 2021. The recordings are available for listening in the Vincent Voice Library, Michigan State University, and on the Web.
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