WASHINGTON — The daughter of a Kentucky sharecropper, Alice Dunnigan rose from typist to Washington journalist as the first African-American female reporter acccredited to the White House.
In “Alone Atop the Hill: The Autobiography of Alice Dunnigan, Pioneer of the National Black Press” (University of Georgia Press, 2015), Carol McCabe Booker has condensed Dunnigan’s 1974 self-published autobiography to appeal to a general audience and has added scholarly annotations that provide historical context. Dunnigan’s dynamic story reveals her importance to journalism, women’s history and the civil-rights movement.
Booker will discuss and sign her book on Wednesday, October 7, 2015 at noon at the Library of Congress in its Mary Pickford Theater, on the third floor of the James Madison Building, at 101 Independence Ave. S.E., Washington, D.C. This Books & Beyond event is sponsored by the Library’s Center for the Book. It is free and open to the public; no tickets are required.
In addition to her White House reporting position, Dunnigan also was the first black female reporter to travel with a U.S. president; to be credentialed by the House and Senate Press Galleries; to be accredited to the State Department and the Supreme Court; and to be voted into the White House Newswomen’s Association and the Women’s National Press Club.
Carol McCabe Booker is a former journalist and Washington attorney. She is co-author with her husband, journalist Simeon Booker, of the acclaimed history “Shocking the Conscience: A Reporter’s Account of the Civil Rights Movement.”
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