Colby College honors Washington Post writer

WATERVILLE – A Washington Post reporter who helped expose the mistreatment of wounded war veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center was honored Sunday by Colby College as this year’s winner of the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award.

Earlier this year, Anne Hull shared the Pulitzer Prize for the newspaper’s series on conditions at the hospital.

In her speech Sunday night at the Lovejoy Convocation in Waterville, Hull emphasized the importance of allowing reporters to chase down tips. She said she was given four months to run down the tip that led to the Post’s prize-winning investigative series.

The Lovejoy award is named for the Colby alumnus who was killed in 1837 in Alton, Ill., while defending his abolitionist press against a pro-slavery mob.