Lovejoy Award goes to slain journalist
Copyright © 2002 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc.
WATERVILLE — Tamara Pearl, sister to murdered Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, accepted the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award in his honor Wednesday night to a standing ovation.
Staff photo by JONATHAN MIANOTamara Pearl receives a standing ovation after receiving the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award on behalf of her brother, the late Daniel Pearl, Wednesday at Colby College in Waterville. click to enlarge
Colby College presents the award each year to an American journalist who displays courage in pursuit of the truth. Lovejoy, an Albion native and Colby's valedictorian in the Class of 1826, was killed in Alton, Ill., in 1837 while defending his right to print antislavery sentiments in his newspaper. Nov. 9 was the 200th anniversary of his birth.
In January, Daniel Pearl was abducted and murdered while en route to interview a Muslim fundamentalist leader in Pakistan.
Colby President William "Bro" Adams, presented the award to Pearl's sister before about 300 journalists, professors, business people, students, and others who turned out for the event at Colby's Lorimer Chapel.
"Daniel Pearl — beloved husband, father, son, brother and friend, talented musician, gifted reporter, writer, champion of truth and advocate for justice — we honor your memory here tonight," Williams said.
Adams said Pearl's passionate commitment to truth, his abiding search for knowledge, his courage in the pursuit of understanding and his exemplary humanity earned him the respect and gratitude of the nation.
"Those who took your life hoped to kill that for which you stood," he said. "Instead, they inspired a worldwide effort to promote your ideals and to honor your memory. Just as Elijah Parish Lovejoy's death failed to extinguish his candle and instead fanned the flames of abolition, justice and freedom of the press, so too your untimely death ignited a wildfire and spread your message of understanding, hope and reconciliation."
Tamara Pearl stood to long, loud applause from the audience. She said she weas glad she had read Adams' remarks about Pearl earlier in the evening, because she was able to shed all her tears.
The award, she said, meant a lot to her and her family, particularly because of Lovejoy's persistence in standing up for what he believed to be right.
Daniel Pearl and Lovejoy shared such qualities as intelligence, integrity and courage. While her brother was very cautious and was worried about going into Afghanistan, he was very courageous in other ways, she said.
In the end, he was not intimidated by his captors, not afraid to tell him that he and his family are Jewish, she said.
"Danny was an ordinary guy with an ordinary sense of decency," she said.
Tamara Pearl, who bears a striking resemblance to her brother, is one of the founders of the Daniel Pearl Foundation, which seeks to reduce cultural, ethnic and religious hatred.
"Thank you for this award, which symbolizes the qualities in Danny's life that touched so many people in his death," she said.
The Wall Street Journal's Boston bureau chief, Gary Putka, spoke of Daniel Pearl's proficiency with a fiddle, his keen sense of humor, and his penchant for inviting all sorts of people to dinner, including strangers in distress he met on the street.
Putka said he has heard the view from some people that Pearl was a naive, gentle soul.
"I reject this view," he said. "Daniel Pearl was well-acquainted with the dangers he faced. He chose to accept those dangers to pursue the truth."
About 250 people attended a private dinner in Page Commons prior to the Lovejoy convocation. A panel discussion on the perils of reporting in war time at home and abroad was held following the award presentation in Lorimer Chapel.
David Broder, syndicated columnist and national political reporter for the Washington Post, moderated the panel. Broder, a regular commentator on NBC's "Meet the Press," is a Pulitzer Prize winner and 1990 Lovejoy Award recipient.
Wednesday's panel included Noreen Ahmed-Ullah, a Muslim woman and reporter for the Chicago Tribune who has covered the war in Afghanistan; Ann Cooper, executive director of the Committee to Protect Journalists; and Anthony Lewis, retired New York Times recipient and the 1983 Lovejoy Award recipient.
During the panel discussion, Cooper said that in the last 10 years, 389 journalists have been killed —14 of whom were Americans.
"American journalists covering conflicts today clearly feel in greater danger, and their fear is well-founded," she said.
Lewis said Lovejoy's lesson to people in the news business is to speak out, in spite of efforts to hide the truth.
"It is up to us in the press to keep a count of what the government has done and is doing to civil liberties in the name of fighting terrorism," he said.
The president can put a person in military confinement without a lawyer just by designating him an enemy combatant, he said.
"To me, the proposition is so amazing that even as I utter it, it is hard for me to believe."
Amy Calder — 861-9247 acalder@centralmaine.com