Fleming spent his entire professional life as a journalist. He began working as a reporter for the Elkins Inter-Mountain newspaper, while he was still a college student. In 1922, after his year at Columbia University, he went to Baltimore, where he spent a year on the staff of The Baltimore American.[2] In 1923 he took a job on the city staff of The Baltimore Sun. He worked in the Sun's Washington bureau in 1926–27, then ran its New York bureau in 1927–28, its Chicago bureau in 1928–29, and its London bureau for another two years.[5]
In 1931, he returned to the Sun's Washington bureau. He took part in the coverage of the 1936 and 1940 conventions of both major political parties. In November 1940, he was appointed chief of the Sun's Washington bureau. As head of the bureau, he specialized in reporting on the White House and State Department.[5]
At his death, Fleming was chief of the Washington bureau of The Baltimore Sun newspaper. He died at the age of 56 in Johns Hopkins Hospital, in Baltimore, Maryland, after having spent several years in "frail health" and several months in hospital.[2]
Other professional activities
Fleming was a trustee of Davis & Elkins College.[2]
Fleming won the Pulitzer Prize for Telegraphic Reporting (National) in 1944.[1] The citation praised his "consistently outstanding work" on national issues in 1943.[5] He gave his $500 Pulitzer award to his alma mater, which in 1944 presented him with an honorary Doctorate of Laws.[2]
Personal life
In 1932, Fleming married Elizabeth Walker, a high school classmate. She died in 1938. They had no children.[2]
Legacy
His colleagues at The Baltimore Sun praised Fleming's "strength of character and the dedication to an ideal that made this small, quiet, modest, warmhearted man, as fine and as uncompromising a reporter as we have ever been privileged to know."[3]