Eugene Robinson to Keynote MLK Breakfast Jan 17
January 2, 2012
CHARLESTON, SC – Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and television news commentator Eugene Robinson will keynote the 12th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Business and Professional Breakfast, 7:30 a.m., Tuesday, January 17, at the Gaillard Auditorium, 77 Calhoun Street, Charleston, sponsored by the YWCA Greater Charleston and the City of Charleston. The breakfast is a part of the 40th Annual MLK Celebration.
Born and raised in Orangeburg, Robinson was 13 years old and lived about a block away from the scene of the “Orangeburg Massacre” in 1968, when three youths were killed during a police firing on students protesting a segregated bowling alley. In his 25-year career at the Washington Post, Robinson has written about race, civil rights and politics. He won the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for his commentary on the presidential race that resulted in the 2008 election of President Obama.
He began his journalism career at the San Francisco Chronicle, where he was one of two reporters assigned to cover the trial of kidnapped newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst. Robinson joined The Washington Post in 1980 as city hall reporter, covering the first term of Washington’s controversial mayor, Marion Barry. While at The Post, he worked as city editor, then foreign correspondent stationed in Buenos Aires and London, foreign editor and later as assistant managing editor. His appointment as associate editor and columnist took place January 1, 2005.
Charleston Mayor Joseph P. Riley Jr., who has served as honorary chair on the MLK breakfast since it began in January 2000, will introduce Robinson at the event. Riley’s invitation to breakfast participants this year stated “This is a special opportunity for the business and professional leadership of Charleston to come together and honor the memory of Dr. King.” More than 600 persons attend the annual event which also features a youth address, this year to be given by Landon D. Blakey, a senior at First Baptist Church School.
Individual and corporate reservations in advance are available by calling the YWCA at 843-722-1644.
