Eileen Shanahan, a world-class journalist, champion of social justice and founding director of the Journalism & Women Symposium, died at her Washington home Nov. 2. She was 77. The cause of death is undetermined, but Eileen, who suffered from rheumatoid arthritis, had been in failing health. Eileen was a legendary figure as a reporter and mentor for other women and people of color long before she came to her first JAWS in 1988. She served on the first JAWS board of directors in 1990, bringing wide experience in organizational management to the job of transforming a women's network into an educational and cultural organization.

Nancy Woodhull was at the podium introducing linguist Deborah Tannen, a long- sought-after speaker for JAWS camp. Woodhull had arranged to get Tannen on our dance card in Napa last fall. They were, after all, friends from when Woodhull was a news executive who had read “You Just Don't Understand.'' Woodhull not only got the message, she passed it on.

Nancy Jane Woodhull, who died Tuesday (April 1) at her home in Pittsford, N.Y., said at her last JAWS camp that she was glad Tannen was there with us in California in September because JAWS was special and always ``filled my well.''

Theo Wilson, a journalist whose coverage of America’s history-making trials from Sam Shepard to John De Lorean made her the dean of trial reporters, died early Friday in Los Angeles. Wilson, whose memoir, “Headline Justice,” was published this week by Thunders Mouth Press, suffered a cerebral hemorrhage as she prepared to give a TV interview about the book Thursday night. She was believed to be about 78, but her age was a closely guarded secret. “A woman who will tell you her age will tell you anything,” she said.