allegations that James Weldon Johnson embezzled money for personal use from the NAACP and the Garland Fund. This disharmony was resolved in 1929 by published apologies by Vann, Du Bois, and Johnson, and within the decade, Du Bois became a regular Courier contributor. But in 1938, Vann's Courier ended up at odds with the NAACP once again. Vann, through national campaigns and contact with President Franklin D. Roosevelt pursued inclusion of African-American units in the United States Armed Forces. Vann saw this as an achievable step on the path to integration of the military, but the NAACP leadership, primarily Walter White, publicly disagreed with this half-measure, despite the protests of Thurgood Marshall. As a result of the Courier′s influence and Vann's political clout, New York Congressman Hamilton Fish successfully added an amendment prohibiting racial discrimination in selection and training of men drafted to the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940. In 1932, Vann officially put the Courier behind the party realignment of African Americans. He urged readers to vote for Democrats, writing, "My friends, go home and turn Lincoln's picture to the wall." In 1927, the Couriers New York City branch manager, Floyd J. Calvin, began broadcasting the weekly "Pittsburgh Courier Hour" on New York radio. By 1928, the Couriers four editions (local, northern, eastern, and southern) were distributed in all 48 states and internationally, and by 1938, the paper was the largest American black weekly, with a circulation of 250,000. Vann legitimized the Courier with a professional staff, national advertisements, a dedicated printing plant, and wide circulation. Later years and legacy Following Vann's death in late 1940, close associate Ira Lewis filled his role as president and executive editor. The Courier maintained its upward trajectory, reaching an all-time circulation high of 357,000 in 1947. When Lewis died in 1948, Vann's widow, Jessie Mathews Vann, assumed the role of president-treasurer. Upon the entrance of the United States into World War Two, the editors of the Pittsburgh Courier nominated African-American journalist Frank E. Bolden to be an accredited war correspondent. Bolden was one of only two African-American war correspondents accepted, and became a nationally recognized journalist, in addition to being city editor of the Courier from 1956 until 1962. In 1953, the Courier published sixteen regional editions, totaling 250,000 copies. This drop in circulation in just six years illustrates the Courier'''s decline. The Couriers decline can be attributed in large