Frank del Olmo, of 'LA Times,' Dead at 55

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(AP) Frank del Olmo, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who rose from intern to associate editor during a 33-year career at the Los Angeles Times, died Thursday, apparently of a heart attack. He was 55.

Del Olmo was a longtime columnist for the newspaper and a major voice for Los Angeles' Hispanic community. He died at a hospital shortly after collapsing at work, Times spokeswoman Martha Goldstein said.

""I don't have to say how much of a blow this is to all of us, and how painful the past few hours have been,"" Times Managing Editor Dean Baquet said in announcing the death to the newspaper's staff.

""As much as anyone at the paper, Frank has been an important part of the life of the city, as well as the Times. We'll all miss him a great deal,"" Baquet said.

Del Olmo had been the newspaper's associate editor since 1998. He joined the Times as an intern in 1970, months after leaving California State University, Northridge, where he earned a journalism degree.

The California native rose quickly through the newspaper's ranks, becoming a staff writer specializing in Latin affairs and sharing a Pulitzer for meritorious public service in 1984 for stories on Southern California's Hispanic community. He also won an Emmy for writing ""The Unwanted,"" a 1975 KNBC-TV documentary about illegal immigration.

He was an editorial writer from 1980 to 1989, deputy editorial page editor from 1989 to 1995 and assistant to the editor from 1995 to 1998.

He was a Nieman fellow at Harvard University in 1987 and was inducted into the Hispanic Journalists Hall of Fame in 2002. He also was a founding member of the California Chicano News Media Association.

As an op-ed page columnist over the years, he wrote frequently on a broad range of topics affecting the Hispanic community, everything from politics to sports to childhood reminisces.

In recent years, he also wrote movingly of his young son's battles with autism.