Webb McKinley dies at 90

Webb McKinley, a former Associated Press foreign correspondent, has died. He was 90 years old. During his 35 year career with AP he worked in Detroit, Rome, Istanbul – becoming chief of Middle East services in Beirut in 1960. AP has more,

“He was larger than life,” [daughter Judy McKinley said]. “He was one of the only Western journalists who had access to the Shah of Iran and the king of Jordan…”
…Richard Pyle, who was an AP correspondent in Vietnam during the war, worked with McKinley in New York. “Webb was a physical fitness guy before a lot of people did that,” Pyle recalled on Wednesday. “I remember he told me he ran several miles before breakfast every day. He was a pleasant laid-back but highly professional type guy who never got overly excited, even when news was breaking fast. He knew his way around the Middle East, I know that…”
“…He was one of the coolest characters you could think of,” said George McArthur, a retired AP foreign correspondent who worked with McKinley in the Middle East in the 1960s. link