Richard M. Smith

Chairman

Richard M. Smith was named chairman of Newsweek in 1998. He had been editor-in-chief since 1984, having served in a variety of editorial roles both in New York and overseas for the preceding 14 years. In 1991 he was also named president.

Smith was chairman of the Magazine Publishers of America from 1996 to 1997 and the founding chairman of the MPA's New Media Committee. He is a former board member of the American Society of Magazine Editors. In January 2002 he received the MPA's highest honor, The Henry Johnson Fisher Award.

Smith joined Newsweek on a four-week writing tryout in 1970 after completing his degree at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism. He wrote his first cover story - on the "Black September" uprising in the Middle East - six weeks later. In 1974 Smith became Newsweek International's Asia editor based in Hong Kong, and in 1977 he moved to New York as managing editor of the international editions. In 1981 he was named assistant managing editor of the domestic magazine and later executive editor.

The Business Marketing Association named Smith "Communicator of the Year" in 1995 and Advertising Age magazine saluted him as one of its top "Marketing 100" in 1993. He is also a juror for the MIT, Sloan eBusiness awards. Smith is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the boards of trustees of Albion College and the Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. He is a member of the board of visitors of Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism and the International Advisory Board of the Harvard AIDS Institute.

A native of Detroit, Smith received a BA summa cum laude from Albion College in Michigan. He attended Columbia University's School of International Affairs before receiving his MS in journalism from Columbia in 1970. Smith is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and holds an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Albion College. Smith is married to Dr. Soon Young Yoon, an anthropologist, who works for the World Health Organization and other international agencies.

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