Longtime Northfield News Editor, Community Advocate Maggie Lee Dies

Northfield has lost another of its pillars.

Maggie Lee, the longtime Northfield News editor and community advocate, has died. She was 92.

Lee worked at the News for more than 68 years. During that time, she promoted the virtues of Northfield like no one else.

Click here to read the story about Lee’s death in the Norhthfield News.

Here is a brief look at Lee’s career that was chronicled in a blog by Susan Hvistendahl that appeared on Patch last year:

If you have ever enjoyed a walk along the Riverwalk or been impressed with our thriving , you can thank Maggie for envisioning and being part of the establishment of both. She has been a treasure trove of historical information of her hometown. She has often been the “go-to” source in my writings. She told Marie Gery in an oral interview for the Northfield Historical Society that she once knew the story behind every house in town—and, no doubt, of the residents within.

Maggie started as a bookkeeper for the Northfield News in 1944 but soon moved into reporting and was managing editor for 19 years, starting in 1967, sometimes working 90 hours a week. Former editor Scott Richardson wrote in his introduction to Maggie’s book Northfield Ink in 2005: “Maggie covered city council, school board, agriculture and business development. She wrote editorials, columns, obituaries; reviewed local concerts and plays; and roamed Division Street year-after-year promoting local businesses and the people who ran them. She has been the community’s historian, its promoter, its confidante, its ombudsman, its conscience.”

Click here to read Hvistendahl’s blog.

In recent years, the Northfield community shown its love and admiration for Lee in a variety of ways.

• In 2009, she was selected as the recipient of the annual Joseph Lee Heywood Distinguished Service Award by the Defeat of Jesse James Days Committee. The award honors a Northfield resident who “exemplifies the commitment to public service which Joseph Lee Heywood lived and died for.”

• Northfield conducted a 90th birthday party for Lee in 2011. Click here to see a photo gallery from that event.

• The community celebrated “Wear Purple for Maggie Lee Day” last July.

Lee’s death comes just two months after Dan Freeman, known around town as “Mr. Northfield,” died at age 72.

Patch will update this story.