Andrew (Andy) Allen Stern ’52

Andrew (Andy) Allen Stern ’52 died in Berkeley, California, on June 27. Andy was born on January 10, 1931, in Munich, Germany. The gathering storm of Nazism forced his family to take refuge first in Belgium and, in 1939, in New York City. He began to build a career as a journalist by founding a student newspaper at Columbia Grammar School and graduating as president of the senior class. He graduated from Dartmouth with a major in French. After graduation he served in the U.S. Army (1952-54) as an interpreter in France. He then returned to the East Coast and continued his work in journalism at the Voice of America and then National Educational Television. In 1959 he met Mary Lou Wyatt and marriage soon followed. They wished to grow their family through adoption and, through mutual friends, located an attorney in San Francisco who facilitated the adoption of daughter Alexandra in 1966. In 1969 the dean of the University of California Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism offered Andy the opportunity to launch a broadcast journalism program. That turned into more than 25 years as a faculty member with many accomplishments and recognition. In addition to his documentary work, Andrew was an accomplished photographer and an early adopter of the digital conversion of print images. Mary Lou passed away in 2008, and he is survived by his daughter, one granddaughter, and longtime friend and partner Lois.