Staff Reports
A former reporter at the Daily American Republic is among four newspapermen, including two former Missouri Press Association presidents, that will be inducted in September into the Association's Newspaper Hall of Fame.
The induction reception and banquet are scheduled for 6 p.m. Friday, Sept. 14, during MPA's 152nd Annual Convention and Trade Show at the Sheraton Westport Chalet in St. Louis. This will be the 28th group to be inducted into the Newspaper Hall of Fame, which was established by MPA in 1991.
This year's inductees are the late Wendell Redden, former sports editor for The Joplin Globe; Kent Ford, former editor for Missouri Press Association and former newspaper publisher; Joe May, former publisher of the Mexico Ledger and former MPA president; and Jim Robertson, former managing editor of the Columbia Daily Tribune and former MPA president.
Hall of Fame inductees or their families receive Pinnacle Awards in honor of the inductees' service to the Missouri newspaper industry and their communities. Inductees' plaques will join the permanent display of inductees in the MPA office in Columbia and in the student lounge in Lee Hills Hall at the Missouri School of Journalism.
Kent Ford is a well-known name for many in Missouri's newspaper industry, having served as MPA's editor for two-and-a-half decades. Ford's start in newspapers, however, came at a much earlier age, delivering about 30 copies of the Des Moines Register by bicycle at 12 years old. More than a decade later, after serving in Vietnam and graduating from the University of Missouri School of Journalism, Ford returned to newspapers with a job as a reporter at Poplar Bluff's Daily American Republic.
In 1981, Ford and his wife, Sharon, with a lead from former MPA Executive Director Doug Crews, purchased the Oregon Times-Observer. In 1986, Ford served as president of Northwest Missouri Press Association, a role that kept him in Crews' mind when the editor position came open at Missouri Press in 1989. Ford would remain with the newspaper association for 25 years, retiring in 2014.
In his years of service, Ford's job went from one of primarily-mailed correspondence to the proliferation of email as the main way business is conducted. Known for his professionalism and "keen editor's eye," Ford served as editor of Missouri Press News, the monthly Confidential Bulletin and other communications vital to MPA's members, as well as helped to oversee MPA's Better Newspaper Contest.