This archive report was first published on 25 August 2020.
Gail Sheehy, a trailblazing journalist and author, left an indelible mark on the literary world with her thought-provoking profiles of public figures and her keen observations of societal trends. Born on August 27, 1937, Sheehy's life was cut short on Monday at a hospital in Southampton, New York, at the age of 83.
Her daughter, Maura Sheehy, revealed that the cause of her death was complications from pneumonia.
Sheehy's remarkable career spanned decades, during which she studied anthropology with the renowned Margaret Mead. This foundation laid the groundwork for her to explore the cultural upheaval of the 1960s and 1970s, as well as gain psychological insights into the newsmakers she profiled, including Hillary Clinton, Margaret Thatcher, Mikhail Gorbachev, and both Presidents Bush.
As a star writer at New York magazine, Sheehy was encouraged by its founder, Clay Felker, to write 'big' stories. One of her earliest articles took her on the road with Robert F. Kennedy's 1968 presidential campaign, where she wrote presciently about subjects that marked turns in the culture, including blended families and drug addiction.
Her 1972 New York magazine article, 'The Secret of Grey Gardens,' caused a sensation by revealing the little-known bohemian life of Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale, an aunt of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, and her daughter, known as Little Edie.
Sheehy's most famous and influential book, 'Passages' (1976), examined the predictable crises of adult life and how to use them as opportunities for creative change. The Library of Congress named it one of the 10 most influential books of modern times.
As she once said in a 2016 commencement speech at the University of Vermont, 'Whenever you hear about a great cultural phenomenon — a revolution, an assassination, a notorious trial, an attack on the country — drop everything.' She urged her audience to 'get on a bus or train or plane and go there, stand at the edge of the abyss, and look down into it.'
