Margaret Moth

Today’s blog honors Margaret Moth, a CNN wartime photojournalist, who died March 21, 2010 of colon cancer at the age of 59 years.    Moth led her life with the same passion and drive as did so many others who are remembered in Women’s History Month.

Moth was never part of the norm.  Her appearance of jet-black hair, heavy eyeliner, black clothes and combat boots made her stand out in a crowd.     She even changed her name from Margaret Wilson to Margaret Gipsy Moth in honor of a particular plane she used to skydive from, barefoot.

Photojournalism became her life’s work due to Moth’s love of history and her desire to see it unfold.  While in Sarajevo in 1992, she barely survived being shot in the mouth while filming the soldier who shot her.  The injury left her face and throat severly damaged, as well as her ability to talk.  Others were angry that she was shot as she was riding in a van that was clearly marked as carrying members of the press.  But, Moth was not angry.  She said “I don’t blame anyone for firing at me.  They’re in a war, and I stepped into it.”  After numerous surgeries, six months later she returned to Sarajevo to re-join her CNN colleagues.  

Moth’s CNN co-workers speak of her kindness and concern she had for her fellow correspondents.   She taught the new correspondents how to sleep behind couches, how to walk through land mind fields, and showed them how to make the most of their work in telling the stories they covered.

When Moth found out she had terminal cancer, she laughed and said that she wished she could go out with “a bit more flair.”   She added that the important thing is to know you have lived your life to the fullest.

CNN honored Moth after her cancer diagnosis in 2009 with the documentary “Fearless: The Margaret Moth Story.”  Below is the link to the documentary of this incredible woman.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/09/25/margaret.moth.film/index.html