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Ida B. Wells Wins Special Pulitzer Prize

CHICAGO (CBS) -- Ida B. Wells, the Chicago journalist who wrote investigative stories about African American lynchings, received a posthumous Pulitzer Special Citation.

In presenting the award, the Pulitzer Committee said the African American journalist and civil rights activist Ida B. Wells noted "her outstanding and courageous reporting" on lynchings.

Wells was a journalist and publisher in the late 1800s and later helped found civil rights and women's suffrage groups. She died in 1931. The board said the citation comes with a bequest of at least $50,000 in support of Wells' mission, with recipients to be announced.

Wells came to Illinois from Tennessee. She lived and worked in Chicago until her death in 1931. Her home, where she lived until 1929, is a registered National Historic Landmark.

The initial Pulitzer ceremony, which had been scheduled for April 20, was pushed to give Pulitzer Board members who were busy covering the pandemic more time to evaluate the finalists.

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