Best business reporting from abroad
One of the few Americans to be interned twice during World War II, Philip Whitcomb has been a working news correspondent in Europe for about 30 years. He receives the 1970 $500 OPC Award for his series of articles in the Christian Science Monitor with, in the words of the OPC judges, “penetrating and incisive reporting on the economic and political implications of the changes in the French economy” during 1969.
Whitcomb was European correspondent for Harper’s Weekly and the Boston Evening Transcript in 1941 and, upon the death that year of the Transcript, became AP correspondent in occupied France for Louis Lochner, bureau chief in Berlin, who was temporarily responsible for French coverage. He was interned in 1942 and exchanged at Lisbon, returning immediately to un-occupied France as correspondent for the Baltimore Sun; was interned once again and exchanged in 1944. He continued writing for the Sun until 1947 in Europe.
In 1947 he joined Macnens (European Economic News), and for the next 20 years simultaneously edited the Euromarket News, a weekly news service, and three English-language economic monthlies. In 1954 he also became a regular European correspondent for the Christian Science Monitor on economic news.
Philip Whitcomb, a native of Topeka, Kansas, was a Rhodes Scholar from 1911 to 1914 and holds B.A. and D. Litt. Degrees from Washburn University as well as B.A. and M.A. degrees from Oxford University. Now 79, he lives in Paris.