Ex-Daily News publisher Ash dies at 99

Helped boost profile of Shiny Sheet across globe

Former Palm Beach Daily News publisher and lifelong reporter Agnes Ash died March 22 at age 99, her family said.

Mrs. Ash, known as “Aggie,” was a voracious reader and prolific writer whose passion for the written word took her from the Dayton Daily News, to the Washington Times-Herald and Atlanta Constitution, then The New York Times and The Miami News, and finally to Palm Beach.

She was known for being precise and fair, dedicating more than four decades of her life to journalism.

“On a newspaper, you’re creating a new product every day, so your triumphs are kind of short-lived, but so are your tragedies,” Mrs. Ash said in a 1991 Palm Beach Post article about her retirement.

“She was a brilliant reporter and fearless writer, a loving wife and mother and a gregarious force for good,” said Ellen Koteff Uribe, who worked with Mrs. Ash for 13 years at the Palm Beach Daily News.

Joyce Reingold, who succeeded Mrs. Ash as publisher of the Palm Beach Daily News, said her predecessor was a trailblazer.

“She helped raise the profile of the paper internationally, making the Shiny Sheet almost a password that guaranteed access to even the most reclusive interview subjects,” Reingold said.

A path to Palm Beach

Mrs. Ash was born Nov. 14, 1924, in New York City. She grew up on a New Jersey farm owned by her parents, Olga and Mathew Paul McCarty, and in Indiana, according to a detailed recollection of her life shared with the Daily News by her family. Mrs. Ash’s love of reading developed as a girl and she spent a lot of time at the library, where at age 12 she