Rudolph A. Pyatt Jr., a Washington Post local business columnist who retired in 2000 after 19 years writing a twice-weekly column, died earlier this month at 88.
Washington Post reporter Bart Barnes writes, “Mr. Pyatt was among an early corps of Black journalists that cracked the segregation barriers of Southern newspapers when he began his career in 1964 at his hometown publication, the Charleston (S.C.) News & Courier.
“He became a Washington correspondent in 1968 but soon left for work as a reporter at WETA, the Washington-area public TV station. He also spent a few years as director of public affairs for the D.C. public schools and as a consultant in the Washington mayor’s office before joining the Washington Star as a writer and editor. After the paper closed in 1981, he joined The Post and wrote his business column focused on economic development, taxes, commercial real estate and local government.
“In his farewell column, Mr. Pyatt wrote about changes he had witnessed in the Washington business world and the closing of mainstays such as Garfinckel’s and the Woodward & Lothrop department stores and Perpetual Federal Savings.”
Read more here.
