"Malvin Russell Goode"(February 13,1908-

He was born in White Plains,Virginia,his family moved to Homestead,Pennsylvania,near Pittsburgh when he was young.He was the third of four boys and two girls:James,Williams,Mary,Allan,and Ruth.His grandparents had once been slaves,and their story informed his entire family life,giving them ambition and determination.His mama went to West Virginia State University.A great proponent of education,she stressed its importance to her children.
His daddy had very little education,but was a hard worker and stressed to his children the importance of finding
work being good as possible at it.Malvin's daddy worked at the Carnegie Steel Company and eventually moved up to the highest position an African American men could have at that time in the company-that
of first helper in the open hearth.When World War I,ended,he open a first & poultry business.Along with the lessons Malvin learned from his mama,he added to the lessons his daddy taught him,those of hard work and industriousness.Malvin often credited this beginning with his success throughout his life.Malvin grew up and attended school in Homestead,Pennsylvania.During high school he got a job working nights at the steel mill where his daddy worked,and he continued working there throughout his college years at the University of Pittsburgh.
He earned a bachelor of arts degree in 1931,he continued his steel mill job after graduation,staying there until 1936 because jobs were hard to find during the great depression.He felt his luck at having such a good job,and spent time putting aside money for the future.In 1936 Malvin managed to get a different job,this time as a probation officer for Pittsburgh's juvenile court.He also worked as a director of boy's works at the Pittsburgh's Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA).At that time the YMCA offered many insipirational and population programs for urban children and for the community at large.He worked hard to rid the YMCA of some of its discrimination,which was rampant at the time,and he had some success in his endeavors.Sometime in the 1940s Malvin took on the position of manager at the Pittsburgh Housing Authority,where he stayed for six years.It was not until 1948,when he was 40 that he began a career in journalism,it was something he had long considered He was offered a job at the Pittsburgh Courier,Pittsburgh's premiere African-American newspaper.At that time the Courier was the most popular and bestselling paper of its type in the United States.Malvin then decided to try his hand at another form of broadcasting,moving over to include radio broadcasts in his working life.He began with with 15-minute news show for the station KQV.It seemed he had found his calling,he not only enjoyed the work,Malvin was also good at it.From this one small radio job Malvin moved to the station WHOD to do a daily five-minute broadcast,a consistent job that allowed him to gain much experience in the world of broadcasting.This was expanded into a full-blown news show that he took on with his sister Mary.Malvin became the news director of WHOD radio station in 1952.he had not,lost his love of print journalism,and he kept his job at the Courier,later becoming the first African-American member of the National Association of Radio and Television News Directors.
In 1962 ABC News was looking for an African American reporter.They realize that their base of reporters was all white,and they set out to rectify this problem.
Malvin was was recommended to ABC by one of his friends,baseball player Jackie Robinson,and was chosen from among nearly 40 candidates.He won the position because of his professionalism,and in a history-making event he was assigned to cover the United Nations.in New York City a job coverted by many reporters.He was the first African-American reporter hired by ABC.Only a few months after he took the job with ABC,Malvin had to cover the Cuban missile crisis,when it looked like the U.S.and the Soviet Union might go to war because of the presence of Russian nuclear weapons in Cuba.Malvin covered the debates on the topics at the United Nations,taking the difficult and contentious subject and making it accessible to Americans everywhere.He was said to have distinguished himself in the reporting,leading the way for more equality in news coverage across the country.Whereas the news had centered around white concerns and issues,there began to be more about under-represented minorities.This became especially obvious in the 1960s when race riots occurred in Detriot,Los Angeles,and elsewhere.News team had a hard time covering both sides of the story,and there were few reporters who could do so.Malvin was one of the few who was sent in to cover the riots,and did so with respect and sympathy.
Malvin went on to cover such important issues as the assassination of Malcolmn X and the shooting of Martin Luther King,Jr.He refused to be pigeonholed into writing only subject of race.He covered everything anything newsworthy that he found to be of interest to him and of importance in the world.Malvin was was a huge proponent of journalists helping young people become good future journalist.With that idea in mind,in 1963 he took a trip overseas with other African Americans colleagues to help teach journalism in Nigeria,Tanzania,and Ethiopia.Malvin remained working at the United Nations until the 1980s.He then left that post to become a consultant for ABC,he kept an office at the United Nations Building until he was almost 80 and retired from journalism.He also sometimes reported on international affairs for the National Black Network,and was often asked to speak in public about his years as a journalist and about current affairs,as well as civil rights and and important events going on at the United Nations.
He married Mary Lavelle,with whom he would eventually have six children:Robert Malvin Jr.,Richard,Ronald,Roberta,and Rosalia.He died of a stroke at Margaret's Memorial Hospital in Pittsburgh.