Julie Sullivan, a Pulitzer-Prize winning reporter with The Oregonian, was kind enough to speak to my morning writing and reporting class. She not only had wonderful advice about how to be a good reporter and writer, but she had a very dramatic life story herself. She told us about growing up in Butte, Montana, which boasts the most polluted Superfund site on earth, due to now-defunct copper mines. She also was involved in a terrible car accident while a young college student. She almost died; her legs were crushed and her nose needed to be reconstructed. (She looks fine now and walks normally.)
She was very passionate about giving people time to tell their stories when you interview them. It's about respect. She told us all about people telling her about growing up in state institutions and being forcibly sterilized and how important it was to report those experiences. It's the job of a journalist to be a witness, she said. Societies need people who see. These days, Julie covers veterans issues and their families.
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