ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
Lynne Olson
, New York Times bestselling author of history books, worked as a journalist, first with the Associated Press as a national feature writer in New York, a foreign correspondent in AP’s Moscow bureau, and a political reporter in Washington. She left the AP to join the Washington bureau of the
Baltimore Sun
, where she covered national politics and eventually the White House. Olson’s latest book,
Madame Fourcade’s Secret War, The Daring Young Woman Who Led France’s Largest Spy Network Against the Nazis
, was published by Random House in March to enthusiastic reviews.
Other works include
Last Hope Island: Britain, Occupied Europe, and the Brotherhood That Helped Turn the Tide of War
,
Those Angry Days: Roosevelt, Lindbergh, and America’s Fight Over World War II, 1939-1941
, and
Citizens of London: The Americans Who Stood with Britain in Its Darkest Hour
. Among her five other books is
Troublesome Young Men: The Rebels Who Brought Churchill to Power and Helped Save England
.
Robert Merry
spent forty years in Washington, D.C., as political reporter, newsroom executive, corporate CEO, political commentator, and historian. He covered Congress, the White House, and national politics for
The Wall Street Journal
for a decade, then spent 22 years at
Congressional Quarterly
as the company’s top editor and CEO. At
CQ
he won a reputation as a pioneer in digital publishing. After
CQ
was sold to
The Economist of London
in 2009, Merry became editor of the foreign policy journal
The National Interest
. Merry’s books include biographies of postwar columnists Joseph and Stewart Alsop, and President James Polk, who took America into the Mexican War and expanded U.S. territory by a third. The Alsop book won an Ambassador award from the New York-based English-Speaking Union, while the Polk biography was a
New York Times
bestseller. Merry is currently working on a book about William McKinley and America’s march toward empire.
