His was a long day's journey into night. Stewart Alsop knew that he was soon to die; he bore the knowledge gallantly and wrote about it with unpitying candor.
It was almost three years ago that Alsop discovered that he had leukemia, and doctors gave him roughly a year to live. But his disease proved atypical, and he lived beyond his allotted span. The best description the doctors could find for it was "smoldering leukemia," and between periods of hospitalization he had remissions during which he felt fine, wrote his columns and sometimes even played tennis. But he went through an ordeal of uncertainty, savagely ranging between hope and despair. Out of that ordeal he wrote his memorable book, Stay of Execution, an almost classic deathbed testament that is partly day-by-day diary of the progress and recession of a deadly disease, partly reflections and recollections of the good life he had had and was leaving. Inspired by it, people wrote Alsop from all over the world. Last week Stewart Alsop died, only nine days past the celebration of his 60th birthday.
During his career in Washington, few newsmen commanded more respect or as much affection. He first came to Washington in 1946 as the junior partner of his brother Joseph in their syndicated newspaper column "Matter of Fact." As scions of an old Republican Connecticut family, the Alsop boys were in a unique position. While more mundane journalists attended press conferences, the Alsops lunched with fellow Grotonian Dean Acheson or shot quail with then Secretary of State Christian Herter. But, unlike Joe, Stewart had no arrogance, either socially or journalistically. Said one friend: "Joe's the kind of guy who can rise from an interview with a famous source and say, 'Sir, you have just wasted 30 minutes of my time.' Stew would never do that. He suffers fools more gladly."
Combative Partnership. There was always an element of gallantry about Stewart Alsop. During World War II the U.S. Army turned him down because of asthma and high blood pressure, but he arranged to join the British army and fought in Italy and Africa. He eventually got transferred to the American OSS and was stationed in England, where he courted his future wife Patricia ("Tish") Hankey. The OSS promptly parachuted him into occupied France to help the Resistance. After the war, he left a job with a New York City publishing house to join Joe in Washington.