Marvin Breckinridge Patterson

Born: 2 October 1905, United States
Died: 11 December 2002
Country most active: United States
Also known as: Mary Marvin Breckinridge

The following is republished from the Library of Congress. This piece falls under under public domain, as copyright does not apply to “any work of the U.S. Government” where “a work prepared by an officer or employee of the U.S. Government as part of that person’s official duties” (See, 17 U.S.C. §§ 101, 105).

When World War II broke out in 1939, freelance photojournalist Marvin Breckinridge Patterson (b. 1905) took the first pictures of a London air-raid shelter. She was, however, new to radio when friend Edward R. Murrow hired her as the first female staff broadcaster in Europe for CBS. Before her marriage to an American diplomat ended her career in May 1940, Patterson broadcast fifty times from various locations in Europe, including Berlin.

One of only a handful of American women in Europe working in radio, Patterson was among the first correspondents to use a new short-wave transmitter to broadcast on location. Of her early broadcasts, Murrow told Patterson: “Your stuff so far has been first-rate. I am pleased, New York is pleased, and so far as I know the listeners are pleased. If they aren’t to hell with them.”

Patterson willingly resigned from CBS upon marrying Jefferson Patterson, but hoped to resume her original career in photojournalism. Claiming that her activities would compromise her husband’s work in Berlin, the United States Department of State barred her from publication. Even Patterson’s unofficial efforts to document prisoner-of-war camps while in the company of her husband ended when German officials objected. Frustrated in her efforts to pursue a separate career, Patterson devoted her energies to the role of diplomatic spouse.