War II, McClendon started her own service, the McClendon News Service, which provided Washington dispatches and columns to member newspapers and personal subscribers. A single mother, McClendon often brought her young daughter to news conferences. For the next several decades, McClendon attended White House press conferences on behalf of the McClendon News Service. Activism In 1977, McClendon became an associate of the Women's Institute for Freedom of the Press (WIFP). WIFP is an American nonprofit publishing organization. The organization works to increase communication between women and connect the public with forms of women-based media. In May 2001, Sarah McClendon gave her sponsorship to the Disclosure Project press conference held by Dr. Steven Greer at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., where 20 retired Air Force, Federal Aviation Administration and intelligence officers reported on the seriousness of the topic of UFOs. Personal life While in the service, McClendon met and was briefly married to John Thomas O'Brien. O'Brien, a paper salesman, abandoned McClendon before the birth of their daughter and died during World War II. McClendon later described O'Brien as an alcoholic who "had little to recommend him but my own loneliness". The couple's daughter, Sally Newcomb MacDonald, was born in June, 1944. Works McClendon, S; My Eight Presidents, Wyden Books, 1978. . McClendon, S; Minton, J., Mr. President, Mr. President! — My Fifty Years of Covering the White House, General Pub. Group, 1996. . Footnotes References McClendon, S., Knight, M., Interviews with Sarah McClendon, Washington Press Club Foundation, 1991. Transcripts of the 1991 Washington Press Club interviews. Sarah McClendon papers at the University of Texas at Tyler. External links USA Today Obituary Role Model: Sarah McClendon, by Roberta Oster Sachs, Columbia Journalism Review, May/June 2003 issue, retrieved July 31, 2006 Sarah McClendon Biography and Papers at the State Historical Society of Missouri. 1910 births 2003 deaths American reporters and correspondents Burials at Arlington National Cemetery People from Tyler, Texas Missouri School of Journalism alumni Tyler Junior College alumni Place of death missing Journalists from Texas 20th-century American journalists