Harvey Aronson, ex-Newsday special projects editor, writing coach, SBU professor, dies at 96

Harvey Aronson was a writer's writer. He wrote prolifically himself, authoring seven books. And over a decades-long career at Newsday, he edited important projects, wrote columns and was the newspaper's first and only writing coach, helping to shape the prose of reporters and columnists in a nurturing and supportive way.

Aronson also took that supportive approach to Stony Brook University, when he and his wife, Irene Virag, a Pulitzer Prize-winning former Newsday reporter, editor and columnist, joined the inaugural faculty of the university's School of Communication and Journalism in 2005.

Aronson taught at Stony Brook until 2018. Virag remains the journalism school's associate dean for student affairs and undergraduate program director.

"They don’t make them like Harvey anymore, I can tell you that," said one former student, Katie Epifane a 2012 Stony Brook graduate. "He was one of kind. The way that he drew you in in class made you want to know him outside of the classroom. He just had this very special way of making you think differently as a journalist."

Taylor Ha, who graduated from Stony Brook in 2018, said, "I never imagined I would bond with a college professor. He and Irene took me out to lunch and dinner. We really got to know each other. ... They were kind of like my third set of grandparents."

Aronson died on Tuesday after a long illness. He was 96. "He died at home here in Fort Salonga. We were very close, up to the end," his wife said.

The accolades from family, friends, colleagues and students who became friends, came pouring in at the news of his death.

His three adult children talked about having a supportive and very present father: whether it was attending every music gig son Bruce Aronson, now living in Copenhagen, had as a rock and roll musician in the 1990s in New York, and hearing his father's shouts of support from the audience. Or the fun trips to Fire Island that daughter Linda Aronson, of St. Petersburg, Florida, remembers. Or being fascinated by the natural world with daughter Beth Aronson, of Prescott, Arizona, who recalls how as a young teenager her father joined her at Sunken Meadow State Park to collect samples of protozoa for a school project.

In an interview, Virag said early in their marriage — which would last 33 years — she learned she had breast cancer after writing a sweeping series of articles on women with the disease.

"I wrote about my own breast cancer when I was diagnosed," Virag said. "It was an element of our early marriage. Harvey was 26 years older than me." She said in the normal course of events, it would've been expected for him to get a serious illness first. "But two years into our marriage, I was the one with a life threatening disease. He was wonderful, supportive — right by my side."

Aronson was a big personality, many said, a man who commanded a room.

"As a personality, Harvey was irascible, occasionally pugnacious, irreverent, big-hearted, loquacious, funny, honest and intellectually courageous," Howard Schneider, the Newsday editor during some of Aronson's time at the newspaper, wrote in an email. "Twice, as an editor at Newsday and the Dean of the School of Journalism at Stony Brook, I had the honor of pretending to be his boss," Schneider wrote. Schneider is now executive director of the university's Center for News Literacy. In a phone interview he added, "What came through was his desire to make you better." 

Anthony Marro, another former Newsday editor, said in an email that Aronson "was one of the people who transformed Newsday from a sleepy suburban newspaper into one of the very best papers in the country. He had an unusual ability to work with reporters to improve their work without being harshly critical of what they had done."

Paul Vitello, a former Newsday reporter and columnist, said Aronson "was the most teacher-like editor I ever had. He was very kind, encouraging ... He was just great to work for."

Jack Millrod, director of editorial technology at Newsday, "In the 40 years I’ve been at Newsday, I have met a great many talented journalists ... And I have met some extraordinary human beings. But I don’t think I met anyone in the newsroom more beloved than Harvey Aronson was." He said Aronson "made a point of guiding young journalists."  

Aronson had two stints at Newsday: 1953 to 1970 and 1982 to Dec. 31, 2004.

During his second stint at Newsday, Schneider wrote Aronson "helped shepherd the paper's coverage of Baby Jane Doe," about the political struggle over the treatment of the infant who had spina bifida, which won the Pulitzer Prize (Virag was a member of the Newsday team that won the prize). And in 1997, he said Aronson "edited Newsday's longest series, 'Long Island: Our Story,' and oversaw the paper's profiles of nearly 500 Long Islanders killed on 9/11."

Aronson's journalism career spanned some of the most consequential events of the 20th century: including President John F. Kennedy's assassination.

He was one of the first journalists to cover migrant laborers on Long Island in the 1950s; wrote an award-winning series on African Americans in the North; and covered the Camarioca Boatlift, the first exodus of Cubans after Fidel Castro seized power, according to Virag's chronology of his career.

Aronson was inducted into the Press Club of Long Island Journalism Hall of Fame in 2018.

He wrote seven books, fiction and nonfiction, including bestsellers "High Hopes: The Amityville Murders," the true story of the 1974 murder of the DeFeo family, and the infamous literary hoax, "Naked Came the Stranger," which he co-edited with colleague, Mike McGrady, with chapters written by 25 Newsday reporters anonymously under the name of a fictional suburban housewife. The book — based on the examples of steamy books by the likes of Harold Robbins and Jacquelin Susann — was published under the name of Penelope Ashe, but it was 25 Newsday reporters, including Aronson, who contributed chapters. The book was on the New York Times bestseller list for 13 weeks in 1969, Virag wrote. Aronson also collaborated with criminal defense attorney F. Lee Bailey on the 1971 bestseller, “The Defense Never Rests.” 

Aronson was born in Jamaica Hospital in 1929 and raised in Hollis, Queens, the son of Isadore (Izzy) Aronson, who owned an auto wrecking yard in South Jamaica, Queens, and Anna, who was a bookkeeper for her husband’s business, Virag said. Aronson graduated from Syracuse University and served in the U.S. Army during the Korean War, stationed in Germany in 1951.

Aronson collected cowboy hats and often wore a Stetson, his wife said, in honor of his father, who grew up in Reno, Nevada. "He was a Jew of the West. He taught Harvey to box, to stand up for himself. He instilled in Harvey a zest for life and an optimism."

Aronson, in a 2001 essay, recalled a picture of him as a boy of 5 or 6 in full cowboy getup, including a 10-gallon hat. "I'm wearing a brand new cowboy suit complete with holsters and cap pistols for quick draws, some chaps, a vest, a bandanna and a 10-gallon hat. My expression is one of pure joy."

"I'm 71 now ... I hate guns, and I'm not much for bandannas. But cowboy hats still bring me happiness ... Long Island is no home on the range and people made jokes, but I didn't mind. They called me 'Tex' and said things like 'Look, it's the frontier rabbi.' I can live with that." 

Aronson was previously married to Phyllis Aronson, with whom he had three children. The couple divorced and Phyllis Aronson has since died.

Visiting for Aronson will be held Sept. 20,  1-4 p.m. at Nolan Funeral Home in Northport. A memorial service will be held sometime next spring, Virag said.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations to the Harvey Aronson & Irene Virag Endowed Scholarship for Narrative Journalism at Stony Brook University.

Aronson wrote this essay for the concluding chapter of the Newsday history series "Long Island: Our Story." 

CORRECTION: The year Harvey Aronson edited Newsday's "Long Island: Our Story" was incorrect in a previous version.