William Mandel, Broadcast journalist, political activist and author, Died at 99

William Marx “Bill” Mandel was born on June 4, 1917, in New York City, and died on November 24, 2016.

He was an American broadcast journalist, left-wing political activist, and author.

William was best known as a Soviet affairs analyst.

He was considered a leading Sovietologist during the 1940s and 1950s, he was a fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, but lost his position there due to the political pressures of the McCarthy era.

He started his career as a broadcaster in 1958, with an hour-long weekly program on Pacifica Radio station KPFA-FM in Berkeley, California.

Initially called “Soviet Press and Periodicals”, the program stayed on the air under various names until 1995, when it was abruptly cancelled due to internal conflicts at the station.

He appears in the documentary film KPFA On the Air (Independent Television Service, 2000).

At the end, he hosted a weekly show on Free Radio Berkeley.

Introduction to Mandel’s autobiography, Saying No To Power, was written by his left-wing historian and author Howard Zinn.

His book was praised by author and senior editor of The Black Scholar, Robert L. Allen, musician and activist Pete Seeger and poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

William Mandel passed away at 99 years old.