James Willse is an American journalist who served as editor of

The New York Daily News The New York ''Daily News'', officially titled the ''Daily News'', is an American newspaper based in Jersey City, NJ. It was founded in 1919 by Joseph Medill Patterson as the ''Illustrated Daily News''. It was the first U.S. daily printed in ta ...

from 1989 to 1992 and of

The Star-Ledger ''The Star-Ledger'' is the largest circulated newspaper in the U.S. state of New Jersey and is based in Newark. It is a sister paper to ''The Jersey Journal'' of Jersey City, ''The Times'' of Trenton and the '' Staten Island Advance'', all of wh ...

in New Jersey from 1995 until his retirement in 2011. He is credited with leading The News out of bankruptcy and with modernizing The Star-Ledger. Willse was born on March 17, 1944, in Teaneck, New Jersey, and raised in Babylon, N.Y. He graduated from

Hamilton College Hamilton College is a private liberal arts college in Clinton, Oneida County, New York. It was founded as Hamilton-Oneida Academy in 1793 and was chartered as Hamilton College in 1812 in honor of inaugural trustee Alexander Hamilton, following ...

and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. Willse's first newspaper job was as a copy boy at

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

. He left college in 1965 to be a reporter with

The Southern Courier ''The Southern Courier'' was a weekly newspaper published in Montgomery, Alabama, from 1965 to 1968, during the Civil Rights Movement. As one of a few newspapers to cover the movement with an emphasis on African-American communities in the South, ...

, a weekly that covered civil rights in Alabama. Returning to Hamilton, he worked as a reporter at the nearby Utica, N.Y., Daily Press. After graduating from Columbia, he was a national reporter and editor with The Associated Press from 1969 to 1977. Following a one-year fellowship at Stanford University, where he studied international economics and law. he was News Editor of the AP San Francisco Bureau until he joined the staff of the San Francisco Examiner. He was city editor and managing editor with

The San Francisco Examiner The ''San Francisco Examiner'' is a newspaper distributed in and around San Francisco, California, and published since 1863. Once self-dubbed the "Monarch of the Dailies" by then-owner William Randolph Hearst, and flagship of the Hearst Corporat ...

from 1977 to 1984. He joined

in 1985 as managing editor and was named editor in 1989. In 1990, the paper underwent a five-month strike, followed by its sale by Tribune Co. to British press lord

Robert Maxwell Ian Robert Maxwell (born Ján Ludvík Hyman Binyamin Hoch; 10 June 1923 – 5 November 1991) was a Czechoslovak-born British media proprietor, member of parliament (MP), suspected spy, and fraudster. Early in his life, Maxwell escaped from N ...

. Following Maxwell's death in 1991, Willse assumed the additional role of publisher. During that time, he oversaw the paper's Chapter 11 reorganization and eventual sale in 1992 to Mort Zuckerman. Willse joined Advance Newspapers later in 1992 as director of new media, and became editor of The Star-Ledger in January 1995. In 2000, the National Press Foundation named him Editor of the Year. During his 15-year tenure, the newspaper was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize eight times, winning twice. Willse retired as editor in October 2011 and was succeeded by Kevin Whitmer. Willse has taught a variety of courses in nonfiction writing, including twice as a visiting professor at Princeton University. He was a board member of NJSpotlight, a nonprofit news organization, until its acquisition by WNET-TV in 2019.

References

External links

* http://www.ajr.org/Article.asp?id=1923 {{DEFAULTSORT:Willse, James Living people American male journalists 1943 births New York Daily News people Associated Press reporters