Respond to prefers-color-scheme dark in app web views

Follow section front redirects in Spectrum

Enable NLP source in PCS for load testing

Switch off the News Alerts Survey Widget when we have enough responses

Poll to determine if new LUF updates are available

Allows the winning A/B test variant to be turned on without Spectrum deployment

Show infinite scrolling sections in Assembler MultiView

Show option for NLP article summaries in Action Bar

A general feature flag for Recipe Features that aren't yet released

Feature flag for media team features that aren't yet released

Use new Orca video player for preroll plugin in Spectrum

Show the snow tracker (instead of the heat tracker) on Spectrum

Eddie Rosario and Co. lead the Nats to an MLB-best 12th comeback win

CJ Abrams keeps getting better. It’s time to think about an extension.

A frank look at hot dog prices at MLB ballparks

Strangers help Sesame Street puppeteer after heirloom necklace was stolen

Teen grabs wheel when driver passes out and school bus veers into traffic

Cat climbed into Amazon return box, found alive 630 miles away

The new cure-all for vacation excess: the IV drip 

What’s the best bus to New York? We tested 5 for comfort and value.

You asked: Do I need a passport for my cruise?

Missing surfers from U.S., Australia confirmed dead by Mexico

What lies beneath Gaza’s rubble and ruin

Middle East conflict live updates: Israel orders 100,000 civilians to leave Rafah, says it will operate with ‘extreme force’

Under Putin, a militarized new Russia rises to challenge U.S. and the West 

In photos: The 150th running of the Kentucky Derby

Noem explains inclusion of story about shooting pet dog

Carolyn Hax: Sisters were close — then one accused the other’s husband of abuse

Miss Manners: I’m bothered by a fellow guest not touching their dessert

Ask Amy: My estranged wife is telling my son I’m an adulterer

There’s still time for Congress to Trump-proof the Insurrection Act 

The Post endorses April McClain Delaney and Tom Royals for Maryland’s 6th District

On Press Freedom Day, little to celebrate for Hong Kong’s journalists

Kim Godwin steps down suddenly as president of ABC News

The ‘Access Hollywood’ video cemented Trump’s air of invincibility

The New York Times, alone in its outrage over access to Biden

Book excerpt: The admiral who had a mental breakdown over Fat Leonard

How TikTok changed fashion

How Pope Francis opened the Vatican to transgender sex workers

Twitch streamers become go-to news source for campus protest coverage

After years of delay, Boeing to try again with Starliner space capsule

Divided Trump campaign weighs joining TikTok, the app he tried to ban

Bingo, beaded bracelets and volunteer iPhones power Biden’s organizing effort

This obscure N.Y. election law is at the heart of Trump’s hush money trial

Top RNC lawyer resigns after rift grows with Trump

Trump hush money trial live updates: Ex-Trump Organization executive testifies

Trump Hush Money Glossary

Christopher Dickey, a foreign correspondent who wrote books about terrorism and international intrigue but who was perhaps best known for a revealing memoir about his tortured relationship with his father, the renowned poet and novelist James Dickey, died July 16 in Paris. He was 68.

His death was announced by the Daily Beast, an online publication for which he was world news editor. In a Twitter post, Daily Beast Editor in Chief Noah Shachtman attributed the cause to a heart ailment.

Mr. Dickey, who was editing stories and posting photographs of Paris street life hours before he died, spent most of the past 40 years working abroad, first with The Washington Post and later with Newsweek and the Daily Beast. He often appeared as a commentator on television.

He covered international conflicts from Nicaragua and El Salvador to Libya and Iraq and was described in a tribute by <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJV9oTKjBck">MSNBC anchor Brian Williams</a> as “the real deal . . . a journalist in full, one of those great and curious storytellers who seem to know just about everything and everyone.”

In Nicaragua in the early 1980s, he narrowly escaped death while embedded with a group of U.S.-backed guerrillas called the contras.

“For six days and more than 90 miles through the broken mountains, pasturelands and tropical forests of Nueva Segovia,” Mr. Dickey wrote in The Post in 1983, “we moved with units of the Nicaraguan Democratic Force, the largest and richest of Nicaragua’s counterrevolutionary groups. The conditions set for the visit were that we would not reveal the exact way that we entered Nicaragua or the location of any major base camps.

“These guerrilla units, under the field command in this region of a former National Guard first sergeant they call ‘Suicide,’ appeared to be as well trained and well armed as virtually any regular infantry in Central America.”

In a 1986 book, “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1439140073?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=thewaspos09-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;linkCode=xm2&amp;creativeASIN=1439140073" title="www.amazon.com">With the Contras: A Reporter in the Wilds of Nicaragua</a>,” Mr. Dickey described grisly scenes in which contra fighters turned on one another. Even “Suicide” ended up being executed by members of his own movement.

Journalist David Rieff, writing in the Los Angeles Times, called “With the Contras” an “extraordinary book that remains far and away the best evocation of that sordid adventure that came to be known, in polite circles, as the Contra war.”

Later, after moving on to Cairo and Paris, Mr. Dickey continued to produce books, including “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0871134632?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=thewaspos09-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;linkCode=xm2&amp;creativeASIN=0871134632" title="www.amazon.com">Expats</a>” (1990) about Americans and other westerners living in the Muslim world. He wrote a pair of novels about an American with Muslim roots who joins a Middle Eastern terrorist group.

For many readers, however, Mr. Dickey’s most remarkable tale was the one he told about his family. His poignant memoir, “<a href="https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asin=B0042JSNM2&amp;preview=newtab&amp;linkCode=kpe&amp;ref_=cm_sw_r_kb_dp_YCJeFb9TTBFP2&amp;tag=thewaspos09-20" title="read.amazon.com">Summer of Deliverance</a>,” was excerpted in the New Yorker and was published in 1998, one year after the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1997/01/21/james-dickey-dies/4466b7a4-1e86-4152-b114-e789ce54e456/" title="www.washingtonpost.com">death of his larger-than-life father</a>.

James Dickey was an acclaimed poet who became famous with his 1970 novel “Deliverance,” about four suburban men who lose their way — and much more — on a river trip in the Georgia wilderness. It marked the peak of James Dickey’s fame, his son wrote, and the beginning of his undoing: “Jim Dickey was really on a roll, and all I could do was stand aside, amazed and amused, proud and a little appalled, as he loomed larger and larger in the book reviews, the magazine articles, on talk shows and publicity tours, combative and funny, drunk and outrageous and ruthless.”

When director John Boorman adapted “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=at-gOm93fZg">Deliverance</a>” into a gritty, sometimes shocking film starring <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/burt-reynolds-hollywood-action-star-with-southern-fried-machismo-dies-at-82/2018/09/06/d49f1e3e-b206-11e8-aed9-001309990777_story.html" title="www.washingtonpost.com">Burt Reynolds</a>, Jon Voight and Ned Beatty, James Dickey became so overbearing that Boorman had him banished from the movie set. (Boorman later included him in a small role as a Southern sheriff.)

“Summer of Deliverance” became, in Mr. Dickey’s telling, a grim self-portrait of a dysfunctional family, in which both of his parents were alcoholics.

“We made friends quickly, but said goodbye almost as easily,” Mr. Dickey wrote about a childhood that was in constant upheaval. “We felt self-contained. We lived in Texas, France, Florida, and Georgia before I was five; Italy, Oregon, California, and Virginia before I was sixteen. But by then the corrosion had set in. My mother had begun to drink heavily, steadily. You could hear that tinkling of ice cubes in the kitchen at six in the morning.”

His mother died in 1976 of a ruptured esophagus at age 50. Within months, James Dickey was remarried to a former student who later was arrested on drug charges.

Mr. Dickey avoided his father for almost 20 years, but he noticed that he was increasingly drawn to father-and-son relationships in his writing. In 1994, he visited his father at his home in South Carolina, finding him near death from alcohol-induced hepatitis. He resolved to help his father get well.

“In Central America, the Middle East, Europe — in guerrilla wars and Gulf conflicts — I thought I was getting on with my life,” Mr. Dickey wrote.

Christopher Swift Dickey was born Aug. 31, 1951, in Nashville. He married at 18, then graduated in 1972 from the University of Virginia. He studied documentary filmmaking at Boston University, receiving a master’s degree in 1974.

He joined The Post soon afterward, helping write a <a href="http://christopherdickey.blogspot.com/">promotional guidebook </a>about D.C. He later worked as an editor in the books section and as a Metro reporter before becoming a foreign correspondent in 1980.

He worked at Newsweek from 1986 to 2013, then with the Daily Beast, where he was regarded as a tireless mentor of younger journalists. He had been based in Paris since 1990.

In 2015, Mr. Dickey published “<a href="https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asin=B00OWWC25S&amp;preview=newtab&amp;linkCode=kpe&amp;ref_=cm_sw_r_kb_dp_MGJeFbA3W362A&amp;tag=thewaspos09-20" title="read.amazon.com">Our Man in Charleston</a>,” a best-selling historical account of a British spy behind Confederate lines during the Civil War. He was working on a follow-up book at the time of his death, the Daily Beast reported.

His marriage to Susan Tuckerman ended in divorce. Survivors include his wife of 40 years, the former Carol Salvatore, of Paris; a son from his first marriage, James B.T. Dickey of Arlington, Va.; a brother; a half sister; and three grandchildren.

James Dickey died in January 1997 at age 73. In the two years before his death, he quit drinking and had a reconciliation with his son. They spent hours together, recording long conversations in which Christopher Dickey saw the old sparkle of his father’s mind return, as memories and stories surged forth.

Mr. Dickey reviewed the transcripts of those conversations as he prepared to write “Summer of Deliverance.”

“I was trying to learn from my father now that he was dead,” he wrote, “all that I never allowed him to teach me while he lived.”

<i>An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported that James Dickey’s second wife, Deborah Dickey, was imprisoned for drug possession. She received a sentence of probation.</i>

Read more <b><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/">Washington Post obituaries</a></b>

<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/nick-kotz-author-and-pulitzer-prize-winning-journalist-dies-at-87/2020/04/28/e9964d70-8956-11ea-ac8a-fe9b8088e101_story.html">Nick Kotz, author and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, dies at 87</a>

<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/william-gildea-post-sportswriter-and-author-with-a-lyrical-touch-dies-at-81/2020/06/15/196f2300-af0e-11ea-8f56-63f38c990077_story.html">William Gildea, Post sportswriter and author with a lyrical touch, dies at 81</a>

<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/charles-webb-whose-novel-the-graduate-inspired-a-hollywood-classic-dies-at-81/2020/06/25/301d657a-b62b-11ea-a510-55bf26485c93_story.html">Charles Webb, whose novel ‘The Graduate’ inspired a Hollywood classic, dies at 81</a>

More than 30 regional and national journalism awards.

Muhammad Ali: The Birth of a Legend, Miami, 1961-1964

University of Nebraska,  (A.B., English)

University of Virginia (M.A., English)

Matt Schudel has been an obituary writer at The Washington Post since 2004. He previously worked for publications in Washington, New York, North Carolina and Florida.

Matt Schudel

The Washington Post

Peter Turnley

other

Chris Dickey

Search Death Notices

Place a Death Notice

Request a News Obituary

Obituaries

iptc-media/arts_culture_entertainment_and_media/arts_and_entertainment/literature/fiction

iptc-media/conflict_war_and_peace/armed_conflict/war

iptc-media/arts_culture_entertainment_and_media/mass_media

iptc-media/arts_culture_entertainment_and_media/arts_and_entertainment/literature

iptc-media/economy_business_and_finance/economic_sector/media/book_industry

iptc-media/society/family

iptc-media/politics

iptc-media/arts_culture_entertainment_and_media/mass_media/newspaper

iptc-media/economy_business_and_finance/economic_sector/media/newspaper_and_magazine

iptc-media/politics/political_process

iptc-media/society

iptc-media/crime_law_and_justice

iptc-media/economy_business_and_finance/economic_sector/media

iptc-media/arts_culture_entertainment_and_media/arts_and_entertainment

iptc-media/economy_business_and_finance

iptc-media/arts_culture_entertainment_and_media

client-blocklists/Client List: Morgan Stanley KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Client List: Becton Dickinson KWs - EXCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/CLIENT LIST: Nomura KWs 2021 - EXCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/Boeing KWs 2021- INCLUDE ANY

client-blocklists/Client List: Exxon Mobil  - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Client List: Microsoft KWs 2 - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/GEICO KWs - INCLUDES ANY_4.26.21

client-blocklists/Client List: T. Rowe Price KWs - INCLUDES ANY

advertising/B2_Agriculture/Food Production_legacyaux_PI3

client-blocklists/T. Rowe Price KWs - INCLUDES ANY

advertising/B2_Arts & Entertainment_legacyaux_btb

advertising/B2_Asian Lifestyle Content_legacyaux_im0

advertising/B2_Books, Comics and other Literature_legacyaux_p1a

client-blocklists/HBO KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Ford/Lincoln KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/ExxonMobil 03312021 KWs - INCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/Bank of America KWs - EXCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/WaPo: Combined Disaster Keyword List - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Blockist: Capitol Building Mob

client-blocklists/Client List: Eli Lily KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Client List: Purina KWs - INCLUDES ANY

advertising/Citrix Mindfulness

advertising/B2_Family Matter 2.12.15_legacyaux_lf3

advertising/B2_Family & Parenting_legacyaux_v02

advertising/B2_Health and Beauty_legacyaux_3fv

client-blocklists/BP KWs - INCLUDES ANY

advertising/B2_Family_legacyaux_icy

advertising/B2_Lifestyle_legacyaux_ipv

advertising/B2_Positive News_legacyaux_hlt

advertising/B2_Shopping_legacyaux_sa6

advertising/B2_Society_legacyaux_0cz

advertising/B2_TV and Movies_legacyaux_vat

advertising/B2_Middle East Content_legacyaux_tde

advertising/B2_Pop Culture_legacyaux_ei3

client-blocklists/Client List: KPMG KWs - EXCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/Client List: Siemens KWs - EXCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/Client List: Cisco KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Client List: AT&T ALT KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/FX Excludes All Disney

client-blocklists/Client List: Northrop Grumman KWs - EXCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/Client List: Inpixon KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Client List: Boeing KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Client List: Aetna KWs - EXCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/Client List: Navy Federal Credit Union NFCU KWs 2 - INCLUDES ANY - 12.23.20

client-blocklists/Client List: Google KWs - INCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/Client List: AT&T KWs 2021 - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Philip Morris KWs - INCLUDES ANY 

client-blocklists/Capital One KWs 2 - INCLUDES ANY - 1.4.21

client-blocklists/Bank of America Merrill Lynch KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Google PG KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Chase KWs - EXCLUDES ALL

client-blocklists/Client List: Office Depot KWs - INCLUDES ANY

client-blocklists/Client List: ETrade KWs - EXCLUDES ALL

prism://prism.query/obits-stream&limit=20

The Washington Post Obituaries section has Washington D.C., Maryland and Virginia obituaries, appreciations and death notices as well as historical obits and celebrity obituaries.

D.C., Md. & Va.

The Washington Post offers breaking local news, weather and traffic information for the DC, Maryland and Virginia metro areas, plus information about school districts, crime, government, religion, the lottery,restaurant reviews and obituaries.