Departures of note

In 1947, Eddy Gilmore won the Pulitzer Prize for Telegraphic Reporting-International for an interview with Joseph Stalin while serving as chief of Associated Press operations in Russia. His reporting from Moscow during the late 1940s brought him international recognition, but his personal life there proved equally newsworthy. Gilmore fell in love with Tamara Kolb-Chernashova, a ballet dancer, and sought to marry her. The Soviet government resisted the marriage, and it was only after Wendell Willkie intervened on their behalf that the couple was allowed to wed in 1950. Their romance later inspired the film Never Let Me Go.

Born in Selma on May 28, 1907, Gilmore attended Washington and Lee University before graduating from the Carnegie Institute of Technology in 1928. He began his journalism career at the Atlanta Journal in 1929, where he worked until 1932, then moved to The Washington Daily News. In 1935, he joined the Associated Press, and after assignments in Washington, D.C., from 1942 to 1943, he was appointed chief of AP operations in Russia. He remained in that post until 1953, covering major events including the funeral of Joseph Stalin.

After leaving Russia, Gilmore spent most of the remainder of his career in London, where he covered the funeral of Winston Churchill. He died of a heart attack on October 6, 1967.