Journalist. Born in Pulaski, Tennessee, he was a foreign correspondent in Asia and won a Pulitzer Prize in 1951, for his reporting on the Korean War. During World War II, he served as a Sergeant in the 2nd Marine Division, US Marines, in the Pacific. He was with his unit when they landed at Tarawa and was the first correspondent to climb to the top of Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima, in 1945. In the Korean War, he was best known for describing the adventures of the Marines fighting in the cold of North Korea and how the American prisoners of war were mistreated by the Chinese. He went on to cover communist China in 1957 and served as a battlefield correspondent during the Vietnam War. His last post was in Bangkok, where he served as a correspondent for The Los Angeles Times until he retired in 1983. He died of emphysema at 76 in Sibley Memorial Hospital, Washington. (bio by: John “J-Cat” Griffith)  Family links:  Spouse:  Linda Corley Mangelsdorf Beech (1925 – 2012)*  Children:  William Keyes Beech (1952 – 1986)* *Calculated relationship