Richard B. Scudder, 99, dies; was a newspaper innovator

Scudder was the "conscience of the company" who loved newspapers and emphasized the importance of local coverage that was hard-hitting, his MediaNews Group co-founder says.

Richard B. Scudder, a co-founder and former chairman of MediaNews Group Inc. who also helped invent a process that allowed newsprint to be recycled, has died.

MediaNews Group is a former parent company of The Express-Times.

Scudder died Wednesday at his home in Atlantic Highlands, N.J. He was 99. He visited Easton regularly in the 1990s.

Dean Singleton, MediaNews’ other founder, confirmed the death.

Scudder was a native of Newark who was born into a newspaper family. His grandfather, Wallace Scudder, founded the Newark Evening News and Richard Scudder served as publisher there for 20 years.

Scudder and Singleton teamed up to buy the Gloucester County Times in New Jersey in 1983 and their partnership eventually became Denver-based Media News, one of the nation’s largest newspaper companies.

The Gloucester County Times is a sister paper of The Express-Times in Advance Publications.

Singleton said Scudder was the “conscience of the company” who loved newspapers and emphasized the importance of local coverage that was hard-hitting.