Legendary Detroit labor writer Fogel has died

Helen Fogel, who covered labor for the Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press, died earlier this month at the age of 84.

Allan Lengel of Deadline Detroit writes, “Eric D. Lawrence of the Free Press writes that Fogel also helped land the first union contract for editorial employees at the Detroit News.

“Charles Fogel, her son, told the Freep that Fogel had great affection for newspapers. She worked at the Free Press before heading down the street to work for the competitor, the News.

“He said his mother once interviewed Eleanor Roosevelt as a cub reporter in Maine.

“‘My mother started as a reporter in the women’s section in 1968. She was among those who went on strike shortly after joining the paper. But she loved the papers and the culture of fierce journalism that was cultivated at them and soon was back on the job,’ Charles Fogel recalled in an e-mail.

“‘Helen had deep sources in the UAW and other labor unions. She was a valuable teammate to younger reporter colleagues – they called her ‘Mother Fogel’ – during Free Press coverage of the 1987 UAW contract bargaining with Detroit’s automakers,’ Free Press columnist Tom Walsh, who was then the paper’s business editor, told his paper.”

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