Migrating Snow Geese

1950–1953

Life photographer in the Korean War

She covers the Korean War of 1950–1953 for Life.

late 1951

Attacks by the journalist Westbrook Pegler

The right-wing journalist Westbrook Pegler begins a campaign against her: noting that the House Un-American Activities Committee had often cited her indirect ties to left-leaning groups, he alludes to her communism but stops short of saying it outright. In response she goes on a lecture tour and voluntarily submits to the committee a statement on her belief in democracy and her opposition to dictatorship, of the left or of the right.

1953

First symptoms of Parkinson’s disease

She is forced to slow her career to fight encroaching paralysis; later she turns to physiotherapy and surgery to slow the disease.

late 1953 – early 1954

Six months on the road for “The Jesuits in America”

She spends six months travelling across the United States and to British Honduras for Life; the result is an eleven-page story, “The Jesuits in America,” in the issue of 11 October 1954. The assignment leads to a 1956 book, A Report on the American Jesuits, made with the Jesuit John LaFarge.

1963

The autobiography “Portrait of Myself”

Her autobiography Portrait of Myself becomes a bestseller. But the illness advances: she grows increasingly infirm and isolated in her home in Darien, Connecticut, a pension plan set up in the 1950s no longer covers her health-care costs, and her finances suffer from her own generosity and from less-than-responsible attendant care.

27 August 1971

Died