If there was an Alaska Journalism Hall of Fame, Stan Abbott would surely be selected on the first ballot.
Stan died July 27 near Detroit, Mich., thousands of miles and decades removed from Alaska, but his imprint on the state will endure. His career highlights and other accomplishments are well highlighted by his obituary and other remembrances, but I'd like to make sure the often-invisible Stan Abbott is remembered as well.
He neither sought nor enjoyed center stage, and as an editor was generally able to stay out of the limelight, but his contributions loomed large and left an enduring legacy. In an age defined by dominant publishers (Bob Atwood) and quirky frontier editors (Tom Snapp, Albro Gregory) he was a man of public restraint but unwavering professionalism. Unlike some of the colorful columnists he nurtured and appreciated -- Slim Randles, Mr. Whitekeys, Satch Carlson -- he was happiest behind the scenes. He wouldn't have duplicated the antics of his more flamboyant reporters -- C. Robert Zelnick, Allan Dodds Frank or, occasionally, me -- but he always stood foursquare behind us.
Stan set standards and elevated the work of all of us who stretched to reach them. Unlike many in his role, he was an advocate for excellence across the whole paper: investigations, politics and disaster coverage, to be sure, but also compelling visual journalism, clean newspaper design, smartly focused features and lively sports reporting.
Alaska editors didn't sit in glass-walled offices in his heyday; it was far more common to find him at the news desk, glue pot and pica pole at hand, producing inside sections early in the day and editing breaking copy late in the evenings. He always labored with too little staff or budget, too many ideas and interests. He typically threw himself into the fray wherever needed, and did whatever job he he thought most needed doing.
Stan left Alaska to teach and practice journalism elsewhere in the early 1980s, before the Anchorage Daily News first eclipsed and later defeated the Anchorage Times in one of the country's classic newspaper wars. Before he moved on, however, he had steered the ship to the highest newspaper award -- a Pulitzer Prize for Public Service -- and left in place the people, frameworks and aspirations that would indelibly chart its course.
Howard Weaver was hired by Abbott in 1967 while still at East Anchorage High School and would later replace him as editor of the Anchorage Daily News, a post he held until leaving in 1995.
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