Forgotten Souls: The Search for the Lost Tuskegee Airmen

Cheryl W. Thompson is an award-winning investigative reporter at National Public Radio, professor of journalism at George Washington University, and author of Forgotten Souls: The Lost Tuskegee Airmen. She is the recipient of more than 45 journalism awards, including an Emmy, 4 Salute to Excellence Awards from the National Association of Black Journalists, 3 National Headliner Awards, and 3 Investigative Reporters and Editors Awards. She served as reporting coach for the Pulitzer Prize-winning NPR podcast No Compromise, and during more than two decades as a reporter at The Washington Post, her team won two Pulitzer Prizes for National Reporting. Elected the first Black president of Investigative Reporters and Editors, she went on to become the first president to serve three terms and was unanimously voted board chairman in 2021. She also is a founding and current board member of the Center for Collaborative Investigative Journalism, a Spotlight DC board member, and a member of the advisory board for the Fund for Investigative Journalism, where she previously served as vice-president. Before joining the faculty at George Washington University, she taught journalism at the University of Florida, Georgetown University, and Howard University, and it the recipient of multiple teaching excellence awards, including the National Association of Black Journalists' Educator of the Year. The daughter of a Tuskegee Airman, she is a Chicago native, a graduate of the University of Illinois, and a member of the National Association of Black Journalists, IRE and Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. She lives with her husband outside Washington, DC and can be found online at CherylWThompson.com.