Former Washington Post executive editor Martin Baron to receive William Allen White Foundation National Citation

Lawrence, KS – Martin Baron, recently retired executive editor of The Washington Post, will accept the William Allen White National Citation award during a virtual event April 21.

Baron was selected as the 2020 National Citation recipient and was scheduled to receive the award and give an address on the KU campus last April, but the event was canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Baron will receive the citation, give a speech and participate in an online discussion with students, faculty, staff and alumni of William Allen White School of Journalism and Mass Communications and William Allen White Foundation trustees at 4 p.m. CST on April 21. The event is open to the public.

The National Citation award, which recognizes individuals for outstanding journalistic service, comes from a vote of the trustees of the William Allen White Foundation, which is named in honor of White.

Baron became executive editor of The Washington Post in 2013, overseeing the newspaper’s print and digital news operations and a staff of more than 800 journalists. He retired last month. Newsrooms under his leadership have won 17 Pulitzer Prizes, including 10 at The Post. The Post during his tenure has won four times for national reporting and twice for explanatory reporting and once each for investigative reporting, criticism, feature photography and public service, the latter in recognition of revelations of secret surveillance by the National Security Agency.

Previously, Baron had been editor of the Boston Globe. During his 11½ years there, the Globe won six Pulitzer Prizes — for public service, explanatory journalism, national reporting and criticism. The Pulitzer Prize for Public Service was awarded to the Globe in 2003 for its investigation into a pattern of concealing clergy sex abuse in the Catholic Church, coverage portrayed years later in the Academy Award-winning movie “Spotlight.”

“William Allen White used his words to work for his community and the world,” said Ann M. Brill, dean of the School of Journalism. “That’s the standard the trustees use to select the National Citation recipient. Throughout his career, Martin Baron has upheld that standard. His achievements speak loudly to the impact he has had on American life.”

Before the Globe, Baron held top editing positions at the New York Times, Los Angeles Times and Miami Herald. Under his leadership, the Miami Herald won the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Coverage in 2001 for its reporting of the raid to recover Elián González, the Cuban boy at the center of a fierce immigration and custody dispute.

He began his journalism career at the Miami Herald in 1976, serving as a state reporter and later as a business writer. In 1979, he moved to the Los Angeles Times, where he became business editor in 1983; assistant managing editor for page-one special reports, public opinion polling and special projects in 1991; and in 1993, editor of the newspaper’s Orange County Edition. In 1996, Baron moved to the New York Times; he became associate managing editor responsible for the nighttime news operations of the newspaper in 1997. He was named executive editor at the Miami Herald at the start of 2000.

His honors include Editor of the Year by the National Press Foundation (2004), the Al Neuharth Award for Excellence in the Media (2017), the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press Award (2017), and the Award for Public Leadership from the University of Pennsylvania’s Fels Institute of Government (2016). In 2012, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is the recipient of honorary doctorates from George Washington University, George Mason University, and his alma mater, Lehigh University.

Other notable recipients of the William Allen White Foundation National Citation include Cokie Roberts, Leonard Pitts Jr., Paul Steiger, Gerald F. Seib, Candy Crowley, Seymour Hersh, John Carroll, Walter Cronkite, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., Helen Thomas, Charles Kuralt, Bernard Shaw, Bob Woodward, Molly Ivins, Gordon Parks, Bob Dotson and Frank Deford. A complete list of recipients is at the KU journalism website.

The William Allen White Foundation was founded in 1945, one year after the Kansas Board of Regents established the William Allen White School of Journalism and Mass Communications at KU. The William Allen White Foundation has been recognizing outstanding journalists since 1950.