Mel Wax

Mel Wax was the principal anchor of "Newsroom," the KQED (Channel 9) program that grew out of "Newspaper of the Air," a round-table of reporters and editors who delivered the news on TV every night during the seven-week San Francisco newspaper strike of 1968. When the strike ended, he continued anchoring the show until 1977. After leaving KQED, he became the chief press aide for Mayor George Moscone, who was assassinated in 1978. Mr. Wax stayed at City Hall to work for Mayor (now U.S. Sen.) Dianne Feinstein. In January 1982, he left City Hall to become the public affairs director for the Port of Oakland, a job he held until his retirement in 1994. Mr. Wax spent World War II commanding a Navy submarine chaser in the Pacific. After the war, he wrote for small papers in New England, and in 1949, spent a year at Harvard on a Nieman Fellowship before returning to newspapers. In 1955, he landed a job at the Chicago Sun-Times. And, from 1964 to 1968, Mr. Wax was on the Sausalito City Council, and spent two of those years as mayor.