Joseph Wershba, a Journalist Who Helped Take On McCarthy, Dies at 90

Joseph Wershba, who as a CBS television reporter working with Edward R. Murrow revealed the story of Lt. Milo Radulovich, whose dismissal from the Air Force because of his relatives’ leftist leanings became a symbol of the anti-Communist witch hunts of the 1950s, died on Saturday at a hospital near his home in Floral Park on Long Island. He was 90.

Wershba went on to become an Emmy Award-winning producer of “60 Minutes.” It was Mr. Wershba who went to Dexter (MI) in 1953 to interview Lieutenant Radulovich, who had been discharged from the Air Force Reserve because his father, an immigrant from Serbia, subscribed to newspapers from his native country, and because his sister was an avowed liberal. After a “See It Now” broadcast on Oct. 20, 1953, viewers responded by sending some 8,000 letters and telegrams to CBS and Alcoa, the program’s sponsor, that ran about 100 to 1 in support of Lieutenant Radulovich. Newspaper editorials also rallied to his cause. That broadcast was the first salvo “See It Now” fired against Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, the Wisconsin Republican who was the central figure in the hunt for Communists in the United States. Although the Radulovich case did not involve the senator, two later “See It Now” programs dealt directly with McCarthy and his tactics. Mr. Wershba helped report and produce all three segments, which have come to be seen as among the first potent blows to McCarthyism. Fred W. Friendly, the “See It Now” producer, later said it was “the first time any of us appreciated the power of television.”