Nancy Dickerson; Trailblazing Reporter

Award-winning journalist and author Nancy Dickerson, whose 1960 breakthrough as CBS News’ first female correspondent helped pave the way for a generation of women, died Saturday after a long illness. She was 70.

Dickerson, who died at New York Hospital, never recovered from a stroke suffered in January 1996, according to her son, John.

In 1960, she became the first female television reporter on the floor of a national political convention and later was the first woman to have a daily network television news show.

She earned a Peabody Award in 1982 for her acclaimed documentary, “784 Days That Changed America--From Watergate to Resignation,” an in-depth look at the Nixon White House.

“It would be a great thing if this program could be shown in every high school and college in the country,” said U.S. District Judge John Sirica, who presided over the main Watergate cases, after watching the program.

Dickerson’s high-profile Washington assignments also included the inaugurations of Presidents John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard Nixon, Kennedy’s funeral and Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech.

She eventually left Washington and reported from Europe, the Middle East and the Far East. For a 1980 PBS special, “Nancy Dickerson, Special Assignment: The Middle East,” she scored interviews with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin.

The Wauwatosa, Wis., native went to Washington after two years as a Milwaukee schoolteacher, joining the staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

She also wrote a 1976 book, “Among Those Present,” detailing the Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Gerald Ford administrations.

A New York resident, Dickerson is survived by her husband, former Deputy Secretary of State John C. Whitehead, nine children and 11 grandchildren. Funeral arrangements were incomplete Saturday.