Memorial Service Scheduled For Award-Winning Journalist, Oklahoma Native

Family, friends and colleagues will gather March 3 at Civic Center Music Hall in Oklahoma City to remember Anthony Shadid, a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist who died of an asthma attack while on assignment in Syria.

Tuesday, February 21st 2012, 2:42 pm

By: News 9

Memorial Service Scheduled For Award-Winning Journalist, Oklahoma Native

Shadid was born and raised in Oklahoma City, but later moved to the Middle East. He worked for the New York Times and was well known and respected for his reporting.

"In the finest tradition of foreign correspondence, Shadid was never content merely to opine from afar," said Vice President Joe Biden. "He went where the story took him – from the fall of Saddam Hussein, to the battlefields of Southern Lebanon, to the profound transformations of the Arab Spring – often at extraordinary personal risk."

Shadid and three reporters were detained for six days by Libyan forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi in March 2011. After his release, he told an audience in Oklahoma City that he felt if he didn't go to Libya, the country's story would not be told.

Many of Shadid's relatives still live in Oklahoma City. Mayor Mick Cornett said the lessons Shadid learned here helped him become a great journalist.

"He took the values he learned in our community – a sympathetic eye, a sense of right and wrong, and the bravery to point out the difference – and applied them to his craft."

Shadid's memorial service will be held March 3 at Civic Center Music Hall. It will begin at 2 p.m.