Print HOF

Robert Cohn – 2012

During the course of his 35-year tenure, Robert A. Cohn built the St. Louis Jewish Light into one of the top Jewish papers in the country. He covered the local Jewish scene extremely well, but he also paid attention to international affairs for his St. Louis readers. He interviewed and wrote about the leading Jewish figures of our time – people like Moshe Dayan, Golda Meir, Ariel Sharon and Abba Eban.

Cohn was present at the White House when Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachim Begin signed their historic peace treaty in March 1979.

He served a total of seven years as President of the Press Club of Metropolitan St. Louis, and was the Founding President of the International Jewish Media Association, comprised of Jewish journalists and media entities around the world, which was founded in Jerusalem in 1987.

Bill McClellan – 2015

Bill McClellan began writing a regular column in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in 1983, after originally being hired to write entertainment listings, followed by a promotion to covering the city police beat. Many of his columns over the ensuing years were based on the premise of championing the underdog—adding his humor and empathy to his unassuming manner.

McClellan began his education at the University of Illinois before he was drafted in 1969 and consequently served as a Marine combat correspondent for ten months in Vietnam and two months in Japan.  After the Marines, McClellan attended Arizona State University where he picked up his first journalism class in the bar where he worked, from a journalism professor who was a regular customer. While at the Post, McClellan penned several books, one a true-crime book entitled Body of Evidence and four books in a collection of his columns.

He was also a regular panelist on the KETC program “Donnybrook.” 

J.G. Taylor Spink – 2012

John George Taylor Spink was an intriguing fellow who quit school in the tenth grade and took his first job at the Post-Dispatch, but several months later took an apprenticeship with his father at the St. Louis Sporting News.

He developed an excellent reputation as a reporter, editor and manager, and, upon his father’s death in 1914, he took over the paper and ran it until he died in 1962.

Under his leadership, The Sporting News became “The Bible of Baseball,” and he is credited for helping elevate the game. TSN also expanded to include other sports, particularly boxing and football. He also found time to author books about sports.

After Spink died, the Baseball Writers’ Association inaugurated the J. G. Taylor Spink Award in his honor for meritorious service in baseball print coverage.

John McGuire – 2012

John McGuire was a long-time feature writer at the Post-Dispatch who was beloved by many. It was written in 2009, shortly after John died in his sleep at the age of 71, that the Post’s editorial board established the Harry Caray Rule in determining when to write an obituary editorial: “The subject must have been at least as well-known in St. Louis as the late Cardinals’ and Cubs’ broadcaster. Well, John knew Harry Caray, interviewed him and bent elbows with him many times. He also knew the bartender who poured Harry Caray’s drinks at Busch’s Grove and the guy who parked his car. He wrote about them, too.” The truth is, for 38 years at the Post-Dispatch, John McGuire simply had a knack for getting people from all walks of life to open up to him. Not only was he a good story-listener, but he was a great storyteller, whose words sparkled and danced on the page as he told with care the stories of other people’s lives.

Ed Finkelstein – 2012

Ed Finkelstein was recruited by Maury Ruben, the founder of the Labor Tribune, in the early 1970s to become the paper’s second publisher, a position he held for several decades.

Finkelstein, a public relations practitioner, was the founder of Union Communications, one of the first labor-focused public relations firms in America. Later, as UNICOM. that firm served educational institutions and specialized in issue-oriented campaigns. Through his early PR work, he helped give a voice to organized labor by telling its story to the public and its own members. As an aggressive newspaper publisher, Finkelstein oversaw the coverage of major union issues as well as investigative pieces that scooped St. Louis’ major media outlets.

Richard Weil – 2013

His career spanned 42 years as a newspaper reporter and editor  – 11 years at the Berkshire Eagle in Pittsfield, MA., and 30 years at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.  He joined the P-D at the end of 1973.  In his years on the City Desk and as an assistant managing editor, he put a heavy emphasis on investigative reporting, overseeing many major investigative series. He also was in charge of Sunday edition for many years.

In 1996, Richard was appointed managing editor and was credited with keeping the newsroom on an “even keel” during a period of management upheaval. Three years later, Weil became executive editor.  He finished out his newspaper career as editor for investigative projects.

He retired in the summer of 2004, but within a couple years he came out of retirement as one of the founders and board president of the St. Louis Beacon, a not-for-profit online news source, which began publication in 2008. In December of 2013, the Beacon merged news operations with St. Louis Public Radio.