Mark Vittert, who may be the richest, most influential journalist in St. Louis, won’t answer journalists’ questions. As a result, he is St. Louis’ mystery media mogul. Vittert, now 64, was part owner of the Riverfront Times. He helped start the buy cialis pill St. Louis Business Journal and similar publications in other cities. Vittert…
Who could blame Arnie Robbins for quiting his job as editor of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch? With the resources of the paper, owned by Lee Enterprises, constantly eroding he realized he could never “do more with less” as he had once hoped.
So after more than six years as editor (and before that nearly seven as managing editor), he announced he was leaving the paper on May 18. As he approached age 60, he said he wanted “to embark on the next chapter of my life.”
Rumors flew that he was being pushed out, just as nearly half of the paper’s editorial staff has been terminated since Lee bought Pulitzer Inc. and the Post-Dispatch in 2005. But Robbins said no: “This was entirely my decision.”
Joe Pollack, St. Louis’ best known and often-feared critic of
theater, movies, restaurants, wine and journalism was still pounding
out columns and reviews up to the age of 81 when his heart couldn’t
keep up with his workaholic lifestyle.
He died March 9, 2012 of an apparent heart attack at his home in
Clayton. “My dear Joe has left us, far more quietly than was his
usual style,” said his wife, Ann Lemons Pollack, to readers of their
St. Louis Eats and Drinks website.
At the annual dinner of the United Media Guild, in St. Louis on Jan. 27, a special tribute was given to Robert Douglas, a former respected St. Louis Post-Dispatch newsroom aide who died in December.
When Douglas and other clerks were forced to take early retirement in 2008, they had health insurance provided by the Post. But they lost it when the paper, and its corporate owner, Lee Enterprises, canceled it for Guild retirees.
Lee Enterprises, the newspaper chain that owns 28 newspapers in the Gateway Journalism Review’s coverage area, including the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, was in and out of Chapter 11 bankruptcy within two months in a move to restructure its huge debt.
The action was aimed at forcing six percent of Lee’s creditors to go along with “an overwhelming majority of lenders,” (94 percent) Lee said it had on board to extend loan deadlines to 2015 and 2017.
The refinancing, effective Jan. 30, means Lee escaped an April 2012 deadline but will have to pay higher interest rates on about $1 billion in debt. The combined interest rates jumped from 5.1 percent to to 9.2 percent. Some Lee creditors will wind up owning 13 percent of the company.