Stanley Karnow, the award-winning author and journalist who wrote a definitive book about the Vietnam War, worked on an accompanying documentary and later won a Pulitzer for a history of the Philippines, died Sunday morning. He was 87.
Mr. Karnow, who had congestive heart failure, died in his sleep at his home in Potomac, Md., his son Michael Karnow said.A Paris-based correspondent for Time magazine early in his career, Mr. Karnow was assigned in 1958 to Hong Kong as bureau chief for Southeast Asia and soon arrived in Vietnam, when the American presence was still confined to a small core of advisers.In 1959, Mr. Karnow reported on the first two American deaths in Vietnam, not suspecting that tens of thousands would follow.He drew upon his experience for an epic PBS documentary and for the million-selling Vietnam: A History, published in 1983.Mr. Karnow's wife, Annette, died of cancer in 2009.A previous marriage, to Claude Sarraute, ended in divorce in 1955. Mr. Karnow had three children.Have more to add? News tip? Tell us
