Donald E. Newhouse, the unassuming steward of one of America’s last great family-owned newspaper groups, died Tuesday at his home in New Jersey. He was 96.
For nearly 50 years, Newhouse oversaw Advance Publications’ 35 newspapers—a roster that included The Star-Ledger of Newark, The Plain Dealer of Cleveland and The Oregonian—steering them through the economic upheaval that toppled many of their peers. His approach was quiet but firm: invest in journalism, avoid debt and, when necessary, adapt.
“You reveled in his company,” Anna Wintour, the veteran editor who ran Condé Nast’s magazines under his brother S.I. Newhouse Jr., said in a statement released by the family Tuesday night. “He filled you with energy and humor when you felt doubtful and weak.”
Newhouse’s father, Samuel Irving Newhouse Sr., bought the Staten Island Advance in 1922, beginning an empire that would eventually encompass magazines, newspapers and digital brands. Donald ran the newspaper division from an office in New York while his older brother, known as Si, built Condé Nast into a magazine powerhouse from another floor in the same building. Si Newhouse died in 2017.
At the helm of the newspaper group, Donald Newhouse earned a reputation as a hands-off publisher who trusted his editors. He served as president of The Star-Ledger, the flagship New Jersey paper that won a Pulitzer Prize during his tenure, and navigated the group’s transition to the internet not by cutting newsrooms to the bone but by focusing on digital subscriptions and niche markets.
“He wanted newspapers to be local, to be the best,” former Star-Ledger editor Jim Willse told The Associated Press in a 2017 profile. “He was an unbelievably loyal publisher.”
Newhouse also chaired the board of The Associated Press, a cooperative owned by its member newspapers, during a period when the wire service was expanding its global reach. He stepped away from the board in the early 2000s but remained active in company affairs well into his 90s.
The Newhouse family’s holdings also include American City Business Journals and the digital media company Reddit, an investment that underscored Donald Newhouse’s willingness to bet on new platforms. Yet he remained a newspaperman at heart, known for wearing rumpled suits and for a dry wit that put colleagues at ease.
Donald Edward Newhouse was born on July 24, 1929, in New York City. He is survived by his wife, Katherine, their three children, and his brother’s children, who together control the privately held Advance Publications. Funeral arrangements were not immediately announced.