ABC News White House Correspondent Ann Compton visited Richmond last week to help raise money for VCU’s Massey Cancer Center breast cancer research.
“Lessons from life comes not from what happens in the White House but from what happens in our own homes,” Compton said, addressing 700 people at the Women & Wellness Valentine breakfast and luncheon at The Jefferson Hotel.
A member of Virginia Communications Hall of Fame based at VCU, the new correspondent told the two groups that she felt privileged in having a front-row seat to history since becoming the first woman assigned to cover the White House for a TV network.
Compton, who has covered six U.S. presidents since 1974, delivered a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the presidency and recounted her career highlights to the audience of mostly women, urging them to find balance in their lives.
As the only broadcast reporter allowed to remain aboard Air Force One with President George W. Bush after the terrorist attacks, she gave the audience a firsthand account of what happened behind closed doors that day. Her reporting helped ABC News win an Emmy Award for its Sept. 11 coverage.
That day, she said, began with the president visiting a second-grade class in Sarasota, Fla. While Bush was in front of the classroom, the head of Secret Service whispered in his ear.
“I was stunned,” Compton said. “No one interrupts the president – even if he’s in front of a second-grade classroom.”
Compton said she was so surprised she wrote in her journalist notebook the time Bush was interrupted – 9:07 a.m.
Continuing her recount of Sept. 11, she told the audience how everyone on Air Force One was ordered to turn off their cell phones and pagers so no one would know the president’s location. She could not contact any of her four children to check their safety, she said.
Furthermore, Compton spoke with Peter Jennings on live TV before she could talk to her family. The first e-mail she received, she said, came from her college-aged son who wrote that a fraternity brother had been in the first World Trade Center tower the terrorists struck.
“All of a sudden the day had a human face,” the political reporter said, choking back tears.
Compton analogized breast cancer as a disease that – like the events of Sept. 11 – reveals the extensive reach of human suffering in the face of tragedy.
“That sense of vulnerability is so real, so palpable right now even if we don’t know someone with a grave illness.”
Underscoring the importance of balance in women’s lives, Compton related her own experience as a working wife and mother, saying women live in a world where they constantly juggle several things at any given time.
“In the White House nothing is allowed to hit the floor,” she said. “The most fun in covering the White House is the family.”
She also described her travels with Hillary Clinton, calling the former first lady “an intellectual, aggressive, smart, focused planner.”
On Clinton’s first solo trip overseas, Compton accompanied her to South Asia where most countries have a dominant Muslim culture. There, she said, laws, religious customs and traditions dictated that women take backseats to their husbands who valued sons more than daughters.
The political reporter described the former first lady seated with her daughter, Chelsea, in front of the female audience who had been told they were lesser than men. When Clinton conveyed her pride in being a woman, Compton said she was amazed to see the immediate changes in the women who had come to hear the first lady speak.
“It was breathtaking to see the lights go on in these women’s faces.”
Comparing her career in covering the presidency to life’s unforeseen events, Compton told the audience that presidents are shaped by the challenges life throws in their paths.
The falling of the Berlin Wall before President George H.W. Bush took office shaped his presidency, she said, adding that Sept. 11 shaped his son’s stay in office.
“We are shaped by unexpected things that come into our paths,” she told the audience.
Susan Fitz-Hugh, chair of the Woman & Wellness organization, called this year’s event a large success following Compton’s speech.
“I think Ann did a wonderful job showing how a woman can juggle family, a husband and a very demanding job all at one time with evidently a lot of fun,” Fitz-Hugh later said in a telephone interview.
Andrea Butler, director of communications for the cancer center, said in a phone interview that women in Richmond have an interest in national news and pioneering women, which made Compton a compelling speaker.
“We find that the women in Richmond have a varied interest. They care about national events. They care about women with interesting careers,” Butler said, noting how the reporter related her career and concern for her children. “She had a message of hope. She also had a very strong message about family and the importance of life.”