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No restrictions. Open for research.

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Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the Gene Roberts Papers #05759, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Received from Gene Roberts in October 2017 (Acc. 103157).

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

Processed by: Nancy Kaiser and Lydia Neuroth, November 2017

Encoded by: Nancy Kaiser, November 2017

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Journalists--United States.
• Philadelphia inquirer (Philadelphia, Pa. : 1969)
• Pulitzer Prizes.
• Roberts, Gene.

Eugene L. Roberts (1932-) grew up in North Carolina and graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1954 with a B.A. in journalism. His career as a journalist included stints as a reporter in Goldsboro, N.C., and Detroit, Mich., before covering the Civil Rights movement and serving as Saigon bureau chief for the New York Times. In 1972, he became managing editor for the Philadelphia Inquirer. During his eighteen-year tenure the paper regularly won Pulitzer Prizes. Roberts retired in 1990, taught journalism for several years, and then returned to the New York Times as managing editor from 1994 to 1998. In 1993, the National Press Club honored Roberts with its Fourth Estate Award for Distinguished Service to Journalism. In 2006, he co-authored with Hank Klibanoff The Race Beat: The Press, the Civil Rights Struggle, and the Awakening of a Nation, which was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for History in 2007.

The Gene Roberts Papers, 1990-2012, chiefly document the late stages of Roberts' journalism career. Included are four volumes of letters sent upon his retirement as managing editor of the Philadelphia Inquirer; other correspondence with colleagues, some with regard to his winning the Pulitzer Prize for History for The Race Beat: The Press, the Civil Rights Struggle, and the Awakening of a Nation (2006); eulogies; biographical materials, including newspaper clippings and magazine articles; speeches on the South, academic and intellectual freedom, shrinking news coverage, and media and the Civil Rights Movement; a photographic scrapbook of the Fourth Estate Award celebration; a copy of the Diane Rehm Show featuring Roberts and The Race Beat; a videorecording of anecdotes about Roberts, who was nicknamed "the Frog"; and a videorecording of a story told by his mother, Margaret Roberts.

• Videocassettes (VT-5759/1-2)
• Audiocassette (C-5759/1)
• Oversize Photograph (PF-5759/1)