PAM FESSLER was an award-winning

correspondent with NPR News, where she

worked for 28 years and covered poverty,

philanthropy, and voting issues. She lives

in Bethesda, Maryland.

In her reporting at NPR, Fessler did

stories on homelessness, hunger,

affordable housing, and income inequality.

Her poverty reporting was recognized

with a 2011 First Place National Headliner

Award.

Fessler also covered elections and voting,

including efforts to make voting more

accessible, accurate, and secure. She did

countless stories on everything from

the debate over state voter identification

laws to Russian hacking attempts and long

lines at the polls.

She also served as NPR’s Chief

Elections Editor, Washington Desk Editor

and National Desk Editor. Before coming

to NPR, she covered Congress for 13 years

as a senior writer for Congressional

Quarterly, and was a reporter for The

Record newspaper in New Jersey.

Fessler became interested in the Carville

story when she and her husband learned

that his grandfather had been a patient and

died there in the 1930s. The family had

kept his leprosy a secret for more than 60

years because of the stigma.