with tuberculosis almost immediately after arrival in Boston and died three years later, after spending some time hospitalized in sanatoriums. Bagdikian was known throughout his life as Ben, though his baptismal name was Ben-Hur, after the Christian-themed historical novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ by Lew Wallace. Bagdikian grew up during the Great Depression, which, according to Robert D. McFadden, enforced a "passion for social justice that shaped his reporting." He described himself as an "Armenian overlaid by, of all things, the culture of New England Yankee." Religion Due to his father's role, Bagdikian regularly attended sermons and "disliked the avenging God of the Old Testament and was outraged when Abraham was prepared to obey the order to sacrifice his son as a gesture of faith." Later in adulthood, Bagdikian became a member of the First Unitarian Church of Providence, a Unitarian Universalist congregation in Rhode Island. Education and military service Bagdikian initially aspired to become a doctor because of his mother's illness and his father's collection of books on pulmonary diseases that he read. He graduated from Stoneham High School in 1937. He thereafter attended Clark University, in Worcester, Massachusetts, as a pre-medical student. He was editor of The Clark News, the college newspaper. He renamed it to The Clark Scarlet, based on the school's colors. The university president, Wallace Walter Atwood, suspected it was too closely associated with communism. Having taken many chemistry courses he sought to apply for a job as a chemist upon graduating from Clark in 1941. He had the opportunity to work as a lab assistant at Monsanto in Springfield, Massachusetts. He served as a navigator (first lieutenant) in the United States Army Air Forces from May 1942 to January 1946. He had volunteered to join the Air Forces immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. Marriages Bagdikian married Elizabeth (Betty) Ogasapian in 1942, with whom he had two sons: Aram Christopher "Chris" Bagdikian (1944−2015) and Frederick, Jr. "Eric" Bagdikian (born 1951). They divorced in 1972. His second marriage, to Betty Medsger, a Washington Post reporter, ended in divorce as well. His third wife was Marlene Griffith (born Marie Helene Ungar in Vienna), whom he married in 1983. Death Bagdikian died at his home in Berkeley, California, on March 11, 2016, aged 96. A memorial service was held at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley on June 2, 2016. Career