Last Updated: June 13, 1998
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RESTON, Va. — Lee Stinnett, the long-term executive director of the
American Society of Newspaper Editors, will retire as head of the association’s
staff effective July 1, 1999.
ASNE will launch a search for his successor, according to ASNE president
Edward Seaton. Seaton is editor-in-chief of The Manhattan (Kan.)
Mercury.
ASNE is an 875-member organization of the top editors of daily newspapers.
Most members are editors of U.S. papers, though there is a sizable membership
among Canadian editors and the Society has begun accepting editors from
newspapers throughout the Americas.
Seaton credited Stinnett with outstanding managerial leadership of ASNE
for nearly two decades. "He has made innumerable contributions to our craft,
especially in he areas of diversifying our newsrooms, studying readership
and confronting challenges to freedom of the press," Seaton said.
Stinnett, 59, heads an eight-member staff housed in the American Press
Institute in Reston, Va. He became associated with ASNE in 1981,
first as project director and then, in 1983, as executive director.
Since 1983, ASNE’s role in industry affairs has considerably expanded and
numerous new initiatives have been launched. Annual expenditures
have grown from under $600,000 in 1983 to $2 million in the current year
(ASNE and ASNE Foundation).
Founded in 1922, ASNE has employed only three executive directors.
Alice Fox Pitts, now deceased, worked for ASNE from 1933 to 1963.
She was succeeded by Gene Giancarlo, who worked for the Society until 1983.
Stinnett and his partner, John Fragale, who is also retiring, plan to
pursue their many interests, which include volunteer work, hiking and gardening,
the arts and visits to Italy. They live in Arlington, Va.
