Longtime industry member and observer Walter Reed died at his home in Wilmette, IL, at the age of 91, according to the Chicago Tribune. Reed served for more than 30 years as the director of public relations for NAMA from 1958 to 1989.
Reed was born in 1924 and grew up in a village near Würzburg, Germany. He emigrated to the U.S. in 1941. He was drafted into the Army in 1943 and served in Army intelligence under General George Patton interrogating German prisoners.
Upon return to the U.S. Reed studied journalism at the University of Missouri and joined the staff at NAMA in 1958. In 1967 he published the book Starting and Managing a Small Automatic Vending Business.
Reed wrote about his experiences fleeing Nazi Germany as a teenager in his recently published book The Children of La Hille: Eluding Nazi Capture during World War II which describes his own escape, as well as the escapes and rescues of other boys and girls.
