Longtime White House Butler Dies

Ninety-year-old Eugene Allen, who enjoyed a long career as a White House butler, died on Friday. Working in the White House since 1952 under Harry Truman, Eugene Allen had a unique seat for the epic civil-rights changes that included the end of segregation in schools under President Eisenhower, the passage of the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act under President Johnson, and finally the election of the nation's first African-American president. Allen, who was honored by President Obama as a VIP at his inauguration, was the subject of a lengthy profile in The Washington Post in 2008, in which he discussed his excitement over being able to vote for Obama after growing up under Virginia's harsh Jim Crow laws.