- Born
- Died
- Birth nameKatharine Meyer
- Nickname
- Kay
- Katharine Graham was one of the most powerful women in American media. Her multi-millionaire father, Eugene Meyer, purchased The Washington Post in 1933. After much success in restoring the down-and-out Post, he died in 1946 and left the newspaper to Graham's husband. However, her husband suffered from alcoholism and depression, and committed suicide in 1963. With 4 young children, Graham became president of the company, at a time when most women were in charge of their households and little else. In 1969, Graham was named the Post's publisher, a title she held for a decade.
Under Katharine Graham's leadership, The Washington Post became known for its hard-hitting investigations, including the publication of the Pentagon Papers (against the advice of the Post's lawyers), followed by Woodward and Bernstein's reporting of the Watergate scandal. Graham and her paper are often credited with bringing about the fall of President Richard Nixon.
Graham served as the Washington Post Co.'s chief executive officer and chairman of the board from 1973-91. Though she retired in 1991, she remained chairman of the company's executive committee until her death. Graham wrote her memoirs, "Personal History," in 1997, which won the Pulitzer Prize for biography. She was injured in a fall in Idaho in June 2001, and died the following month at age 84.- IMDb Mini Biography By: anonymous
- SpousePhil Graham(June 5, 1940 - September 20, 1963) (his death, 4 children)
- ParentsAgnes Elizabeth Ernst
- RelativesFlorence Meyer Homolka(Sibling)
- Inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 2002.
- She was a Republican until college (where she switched to the Democratic Party).
- She took over the reins of the Washington Post when her husband shot himself to death (he was suffering from manic depression).
- Published the Pentagon Papers and made the decision to proceed with the Watergate investigation.
- Publisher of the Washington Post from 1969-1979, President of the Washington Post Company from 1963-1973, CEO and Chairperson of the Board of Directors of the Washington Post Company from 1973-1991, and Chairperson of the Executive Committee of the Washington Post Company from 1991 until her death in 2001.
- If one is rich and one's a woman, one can be quite misunderstood.
- The thing women must do to rise to power is to redefine their femininity. Once, power was considered a masculine attribute. In fact power has no sex.
- My father said to me, and I certainly went along with it, that 'No man should work for his wife.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content