Tom Wicker

Tom Wicker, who reported the Kennedy Assassination for The New York Times from Dallas, died yesterday at 85. Wicker enjoyed a distinguished career as a correspondent, bureau chief and writer of novels and nonfiction.  The Times obit under the byline of Robert McFadden is a gripping piece of work from a reporter who has previously made his bones at this sort of thing. But consider:

Mr. Wicker was a hefty man, 6 feet 2 inches tall, with a ruddy face, jowls, petulant lips and a lock of unruly hair that dangled boyishly on a high forehead. He toiled in tweeds in pinstriped Washington, but seemed more suited to a hammock and straw hat on a lazy summer day. The casual gait, the easygoing manner, the down-home drawl set a tone for audiences, but masked a fiery temperament, a ferocious work ethic, a tigerish competitiveness and a stubborn idealism, qualities that made him a perceptive observer of the American scene for more than a half century.

What would you say are the odds that Wicker wrote this himself?