'Consummate Word Editor' in Grand Forks Dies at 72

By: Journalist and retired University of North Dakota professor Bill Holden has died at a Grand Forks care center. He was 72.

The Grand Forks Herald, where Holden worked as night editor from May 1997 to August 2002, said Holden died Monday in the Valley Elder Care center.

Earlier, Holden was managing editor of the International Herald Tribune in Paris, and an editor for the European edition of the New York Times in Paris. He also worked for the Minneapolis Tribune, the Chicago Tribune and the Des Moines Register. He came to Grand Forks in 1984 to teach journalism at UND, and left the school in 1995. He was a graduate of Drake University.

Herald Managing Editor Kevin Grinde said Holden was "the consummate word editor" whose "gentle way with reporters and their copy always resulted in an improved story."

Holden and his wife, Victoria, and their daughter, Marie, lived in rural Manvel, north of Grand Forks. Victoria Holden, a member of the UND communication school faculty, died in June.