This week in National Press Club history

Nov. 10, 2005: Club President Rick Dunham presents Austin H. Kiplinger, editor of the Kiplinger Letter for 30 years, with the Club’s Fourth Estate Award at a gala dinner packed with 300 friends and colleagues. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor receives a standing ovation before admitting that she “avoids the press like the plague and just got to know [Kiplinger] as a friend.” She bestows on him “The Supreme Court Seal of Approval (by a 5-4 decision)” and thanks him for “raising the bar in the Fourth Estate.” Hugh Sidey then remarks, “There are some people in the country who make it run. He is a big part of the success of this nation.”

A decade later, on Nov. 21, 2015, Club President John Hughes issues a statement upon Kiplinger’s death at the age of 97, noting that he was “one of our most prominent members and a dear friend of the National Press Club for many years...we are grateful for his continued support of our nonprofit arm, the National Press Club Journalism Institute…a giant in the Washington journalism and business community…we will miss his leadership and his good fellowship.”

This Week In National Press Club History

On a personal note, I was pleased to hear at his packed memorial service in the Concert Hall of the Kennedy Center on Friday that Kiplinger was “a history nut." That passion is what led me to write “This week In National Press Club history“ for the past seven years. The Club’s century-plus history is packed with stories and events that vividly tell the history of our time, and it has been rewarding for me to recall that history for our members. However, it’s time for a break, and so this feature will not appear for a while. The History & Heritage Committee plans to bring it back, and accept my thanks, especially to our Wire editors, for your comments and encouragement.