'LaGrange Daily News' Editor to Retire

By: The editor of the LaGrange Daily News will retire next month after more than three decades at the newspaper.

Andrea Lovejoy joined the Daily News in 1978 as a part-time feature writer. She was named city editor in 1985 and has led the newspaper since 1995.

Her final day as editor will be Nov. 20. Her successor, Daniel Baker, has been a news editor at the Daily News for eight years.

"It has been a high privilege to tell the stories and direct the coverage of people and events in this great community," Lovejoy, 61, told the Daily News. "I have loved doing it - and still find great pleasure in being part of it - but it's time to step back and give myself freedom from deadlines and 24/7 responsibilities."

Under her leadership, the Daily News won four straight General Excellence awards, the highest honor bestowed by the Georgia Press Association. She has also been a leader in the industry, having served as president of the AP News Council, an advisory body of Georgia's Associated Press member newspapers.

Lovejoy is a native of Hancock County and a graduate of Georgia State University. She moved to LaGrange in 1973 when her husband, Bill, took a job with Milliken & Co. She plans to continue writing a weekly column and some features for the newspaper.

Baker was born and raised in Macon, and has a degree in journalism from the University of Georgia and a master's in education from Mercer University.

"LaGrange Daily News has a reputation for being one of the best small daily newspapers in the state," he said. "I look forward to helping continue that tradition."

His newspaper career began as a teenager, when he worked as a copy clerk for the Macon Telegraph. He held editing positions with the Macon News and the Macon Telegraph and News. He helped edit a series that won a Pulitzer Prize for the Telegraph.

Baker also worked as managing editor of the Union-Recorder in Milledgeville for 10 years and rejoined the Milledgeville paper before he came to the Daily News in 2001.