On the same day the newspaper he dedicated his life to celebrated its 50th anniversary, 78-year old Germán Emilio Ornes Coiscou called it quits. He passed away of cardiac-respiratory arrest shortly before he would have attended the placing into circulation of his book "Monopoly and its Legal Situation in the Dominican Republic," as part of commemorative events of the gold anniversary of the El Caribe newspaper. Ornes suffered from diabetes and arteriosclerosis. He didn’t make it alive to the emergency room of the Corazones Unidos clinic. Ornes was best known for his permanent struggle for freedom of the press in the Americas and for helping to train hundreds of Dominican journalists, many of whom are today editors of newspapers or outstanding professionals. El Caribe was the leading Dominican newspaper through the 70s when it was surpassed by the more contemporary and dynamic Listín Diario. Ornes had received several offers for the purchase of the newspaper, but had expressed his desire to be the newspaper’s publisher when it reached its 50th anniversary. He did sell the newspapers archives to OGM, a data research service funded by the Banco Popular. Ornes is a past president of the Inter American Press Association, and was recently honored as ad vita president of the IAPA’s Freedom of the Press and Information Committee. A winner of the Columbia University Maria Cabot Moor award, and the Mergenthaler award of the IAPA, as well as the Dominican government’s prestigious decoration Orden del Mérito de Duarte, Sánchez y Mella, Grado Gran Cruz de Plata, he recently received a doctor honoris causa at the Universidad Nacional Pedro Henríquez Ureña and another from the Pontificia Universidad Católica Madre y Maestra. He is survived by his wife Virginia Parra de Ornes, his daughters Clara and Angela Ornes, his son Antonio Emilio Ornes and his sister, Maricusa Ornes viuda Alvarez.
