Purdum

Award-winning journalist Todd S. Purdum, senior writer at POLITICO and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, visited campus on Monday, Feb. 24 as a guest of the President's Forum Series.

A veteran Washington reporter, he is the author of the forthcoming book, "An Idea Whose Time Has Come: Two Presidents, Two Parties and the Battle for the Civil Rights Act of 1964," (Times Books) which will be released this spring for the legislation's anniversary.

Purdum's talk, "The Real House of Cards: A View from Washington," took place at 7:30 p.m. in the Geneva Room of the Warren Hunting Smith Library. The event also featured a panel discussion with Purdum led by President Mark D. Gearan.

Purdum joined Vanity Fair as national editor in 2006 and recently became a contributing editor. He was formerly with The New York Times, where he worked for 23 years, starting as copyboy and eventually covering politics from city hall to the White House. He also held the positions of metropolitan reporter and city-hall bureau chief in New York, and as correspondent and Los Angeles bureau chief.

He is a native of Macomb, Ill., and a graduate of Princeton University. He lives in Washington with his wife, Dee Dee Myers L.H.D. '05, the former White House press secretary, political commentator and consultant, and their two children. She served as the HWS Commencement speaker in 2005.

This information is accurate for the time period that this person(s) spoke at Hobart and William Smith.