Lee Ettelson; Former Newspaper Editor

Lee Ettelson, 89, former editor of the San Francisco Examiner and Call-Bulletin. Ettelson joined the Hearst newspaper organization in Chicago in 1919 as a reporter. He held top editing positions in Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco and Seattle before returning to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1937 to become the managing editor of the Call-Bulletin. He left the paper in 1946 but returned as executive editor in 1951, becoming publisher four years later. When the Call-Bulletin merged with the News in 1959, he was appointed general manager of the combined paper. Ettelson became editor of the Examiner in 1960 and held the job until retiring two years later. Then-Gov. Edmund G. (Pat) Brown then appointed him deputy director of the state Department of Motor Vehicles. Sunday in San Francisco.