Author Visit: Cheryl Thompson

Next date: Saturday, March 14, 2026 | 10:00 AM to 11:00 AM

Join Cheryl W. Thompson for an author talk about her book "Forgotten Souls: The Search for the Lost Tuskegee Airmen" as part of our America 250 programs.

Thompson is an award-winning investigative correspondent for National Public Radio and an associate professor of journalism at George Washington University. She is the author of "Forgotten Souls: The Search for the Lost Tuskegee Airmen" and the recipient of more than 40 journalism awards, including an Emmy, five National Headliner Awards and three awards from Investigative Reporters and Editors. She served as reporting coach for the Pulitzer Prize-winning NPR podcast "No Compromise."

During more than 20 years as a reporter for The Washington Post, she was part of teams that won two Pulitzer Prizes for national reporting. She served as a Pulitzer Prize juror in the investigative reporting category in 2022 and chaired the jury in 2023.

Thompson is a member of the National Association of Black Journalists, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc. and Investigative Reporters and Editors, where she was elected the first Black president in 2018 and served three terms. She is also a founding and current board member of the Center for Collaborative Investigative Journalism and serves on the advisory board for the Fund for Investigative Journalism, the National Press Foundation Board and the Spotlight DC Board.

The daughter of a Tuskegee Airman, Thompson is a Chicago native who lives outside Washington, D.C.