Neil Sheehan | |
|---|---|
| Born | Cornelius Mahoney Sheehan (1936-10-27)October 27, 1936 Holyoke, Massachusetts, U.S. |
| Died | January 7, 2021(2021-01-07) (aged 84) Washington, D.C., U.S. |
| Education | Harvard University |
| Occupation | Journalist |
Cornelius Mahoney Sheehan (October 27, 1936 – January 7, 2021) was an American journalist. As a reporter forThe New York Times in 1971, Sheehan obtained the classifiedPentagon Papers fromDaniel Ellsberg. His series of articles revealed a secretUnited States Department of Defense history of theVietnam War and led to aU.S. Supreme Court case,New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S.713 (1971), which invalidated the United States government's use of a restraining order to halt publication.[1]
He received aPulitzer Prize and aNational Book Award for his 1988 bookA Bright Shining Lie, about the life of Lieutenant ColonelJohn Paul Vann and the United States involvement in theVietnam War.[2]
Sheehan was born inHolyoke, Massachusetts on October 27, 1936. His father, Cornelius Joseph Sheehan, worked as a dairy farmer; his mother, Mary (O'Shea), was a housewife. Both immigrated to the United States fromIreland.[3] He was raised on a dairy farm near Holyoke. Sheehan graduated from Mount Hermon School (laterNorthfield Mount Hermon) andHarvard University with aB.A. in history (cum laude) in 1958. He served in theU.S. Army from 1959 to 1962, when he was assigned toKorea and then transferred toTokyo; there, he did work moonlighting in the Tokyo bureau ofUnited Press International (UPI).[3]
Following his discharge, Sheehan spent two years covering the war inVietnam as UPI'sSaigon bureau chief. In 1963, during theBuddhist crisis, Sheehan andDavid Halberstam debunked the claim by theNgô Đình Diệm regime that theArmy of the Republic of Vietnam regular forces had perpetrated theXá Lợi Pagoda raids, which U.S. authorities initially accepted. They showed instead that the raiders wereSpecial Forces loyal to Diệm's brother,Nhu out to frame the army generals. In 1964, he joinedThe New York Times and worked the city desk for a while before returning to theFar East, first toIndonesia and then to spend another year in Vietnam.[4] Sheehan was one of numerous U.S. and international journalists who received valuable information fromPham Xuan An, a 20-year veteran correspondent forTime Magazine andReuters, later revealed to also be a spy for theNational Liberation Front for South Vietnam.[5]
In the fall of 1966, he became thePentagon correspondent. Two years later, he began reporting on theWhite House. He was a correspondent on political, diplomatic, and military affairs. After being notified of their existence byMarcus Raskin and Ralph Stavins at theInstitute for Policy Studies, Sheehan copied thePentagon Papers for theTimes on March 2, 1971,[6][7][8][9][10] against leaker and Vietnam-era acquaintanceDaniel Ellsberg's wishes. He made the copies with the help of his wife Susan in numerous copy shops in Boston, then they flew with the copies to a hotel room atThe Jefferson in Washington for reading, before mailing them to his editorJames L. Greenfield's apartment, then he worked with Greenfield and a large team of editors, writers and lawyers on organizing the copies for publication in theNew York Hilton Midtown, as he would later reveal in 2015.[11][10] The U.S. government tried to halt publication and the case,New York Times Co. v. United States (403 U.S. 713), saw the U.S. Supreme Court reject the government's position and establish a landmarkFirst Amendment decision. The exposé would earnThe New York Times thePulitzer Prize for Public Service.[3]
In 1970, Sheehan reviewedConversations With Americans byMark Lane in theNew York Times Book Review. He called the work a collection of Vietnam War crime stories with some obvious flaws which the author had not verified. Sheehan called for more thorough and scholarly work to be done on thewar crimes being committed in Vietnam.[12]
Sheehan published an article in theNew York Times Book Review on March 28, 1971, entitled "Should We have War Crime Trials?". He suggested that the conduct of the Vietnam War could be acrime against humanity and that senior U.S. political and military leaders could be subject to trial. In response, the Pentagon prepared a detailed rebuttal justifying its conduct of the war and exonerating senior commanders, however, the rebuttal was never released due to the belief that it would only exacerbate the issue.[13]
Sheehan published his first book,The Arnheiter Affair, in 1972.Marcus Aurelius Arnheiter, the subject of the book, proceeded to bring an action forlibel against Sheehan but was ultimately unsuccessful.[14] Sheehan then secured an unpaid leave from theTimes to work on a book aboutJohn Paul Vann, a dramatic figure among American leaders in the early stages of the war in Vietnam. Two years later, in November 1974, Sheehan was badly injured in a road accident on a snowy mountain road inwestern Maryland. Sheehan's wife, the veteranNew Yorker staff writerSusan Sheehan, chronicled details of the accident and its emotional, legal, and financial impact in a 1978 article for the magazine.[15] The time and effort spent fighting three libel suits in connection with his first book that endured until 1979, and Sheehan's lengthy recovery from his injuries, delayed work on his Vietnam book. After theTimes ended his unpaid leave in 1976, he formally resigned from the newspaper to continue work on the book.[16]
Although he received an advance of $67,500 (of which he was entitled to $45,000 prior to publication) fromRandom House in 1972, Sheehan – a "dreadfully slow" writer who "[chased after] the last fact" – mainly subsisted on lecture fees and fellowships from theJohn Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation (1973–1974), the Adlai Stevenson Institute of International Studies at theUniversity of Chicago (1973–1975), theLehrman Institute (1975–1976), theRockefeller Foundation (1976–1977), and theWoodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (1979–1980) for the remainder of the 1970s.[17] According to William Prochnau, the latter fellowship marked a significant "turning point" for the book, as Sheehan "talked about Vietnam all day long every day" withPeter Braestrup after abandoning several hundred manuscript pages later characterized as a "false start" by Susan Sheehan.[16][17][18] When Sheehan finished "three-fifths of the manuscript" in the summer of 1981, the initial advance was renegotiated and raised to $200,000 with a projected delivery date of 1983, whileWilliam Shawn ofThe New Yorker agreed to excerpt the finished manuscript and advance funds as needed.[16]
Still beset by health problems (including apinched nerve andosteoarthritis), he eventually completed the book,A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam, in 1986.[16] Edited byRobert Loomis and published in 1988, it was nominated for thePulitzer Prizes in Biography and History and received thePulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.[19] It also won theNational Book Award for Nonfiction.[20] In 1990, Sheehan received the Golden Plate Award of theAmerican Academy of Achievement.[21][22][23]
| External videos | |
|---|---|
 Q&A interview with Sheehan onA Fiery Peace in a Cold War, September 20, 2009,C-SPAN |
Sheehan released the book,After the War Was Over: Hanoi and Saigon, in 1992.[24] It was inspired by his visit to Vietnam three years earlier.[3] He published his last book,A Fiery Peace in a Cold War, in 2009. It detailed the story ofBernard Schriever, who was the father of the U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile system.[3][14]
Sheehan was introduced to his wife,Susan Margulies, by fellow reporterGay Talese.[14] She wrote forThe New Yorker at the time,[14] and subsequently won the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction forIs There No Place on Earth for Me? in 1983.[19] They married in 1965,[14] and had two daughters (Catherine and Maria).[3]
Sheehan died on January 7, 2021, at his home inWashington, D.C. He was 84, and suffered from complications ofParkinson's disease in the time leading up to his death.[3]
Sheehan was portrayed byJonas Chernick inThe Pentagon Papers (2003),[26] andJustin Swain inThe Post (2017).[27] He appears as himself inKen Burns' 2017 documentary seriesThe Vietnam War.[28]
This article incorporates text from this source, which is in thepublic domain.Awards Council member Neil Sheehan presents Thomas L. Friedman, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author, with the Academy's Golden Plate Award during the 2003 International Achievement Summit in Washington, D.C.
| Archives at | ||
|---|---|---|
| ||
| How to use archival material |
