Leonard Pitts, Jr.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Leonard Pitts, Jr. will be the keynote speaker for Asheville’s 29th annual Martin Luther King Prayer Breakfast.

Leonard Pitts began writing professionally as a college student, doing freelance reviews and profiles for SOUL, a national black entertainment tabloid, and he gained national acclaim for “Who We Are,” an award-winning 1988 radio documentary on the history of black America that he wrote, produced, and syndicated. His work has appeared in such publications as Musician, Spin, TV Guide, The Reader’s Digest and Parenting.

He was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1992 and in 1997 he took first place for commentary in division four (newspapers with a circulation of over 300,000) in the American Association of Sunday and Feature Editors’ Ninth Annual Writing Awards competition. He has been honored by the Society of Professional Journalists, the National Association of Black Journalists and the Simon Wiesenthal Center, among others, and is a five-time recipient of the National Headliners Award.

In 2001, he received the American Society of Newspaper Editors
prestigious ASNE Award For Commentary Writing and was named Feature of
the Year Columnist by Editor and Publisher magazine. In 2002, the
National Society of Newspaper Columnists awarded Pitts its inaugural
Columnist of the Year award. Also in 2002, GLAAD Media awarded Pitts
the Outstanding Newspaper Columnist award.

Pitts has taught journalism at Hampton University in Hampton,
Virginia (2003-04), and at Ohio University in Athens and Virginia
Commonwealth University in Richmond (2005-06). Leonard Pitts was born
and reared in Southern California. Since 1995 he has lived in Bowie,
Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C., with his wife and five children.