Deceased August 4, 2019
View alumni profile (log in required)
Read obituary
In Memory
David Corcoran, a distinguished journalist and science editor, died of leukemia Aug. 4, 2019, at home in Corrales, N.M. He was 72.
Editors and reporters alike marveled at David’s graceful writing and deft editing touch. Friends delighted in his kindness, insatiable curiosity, wide-ranging intelligence and good humor.
“The main thing about David is, he was the most considerate person in the world,” said his wife, Bonnie Stetson, a high school friend with whom David reconnected in 2009. They married in November 2018.
David is also survived by his brothers, John Corcoran and William Diebold; former wives Susan Cooper and Karrie Olick; and three children—Thomas, Daniel and Kat.
Even when he talked about fighting cancer in the past year, Stetson said, “David always kept his equanimity. ‘I know it sounds crazy,’ he would say, ‘but I am a happy man.’”
An English major, David was an editor and reporter for The Student. After graduation, he joined The Record, an influential New Jersey newspaper, and later led its editorial page. He moved to the New York Times in 1988 and held several top editing positions, including editor of Science Times. He was in the thick of stories like 9/11, the anthrax scare, the explosion
of the space shuttle Columbia, the hunt for the Higgs Boson and the Ebola epidemic. He also reviewed New Jersey restaurants.
“He could cut through to the heart of things,” said Alan Finder, a longtime colleague, “but he always did it in a gentle way.”
After “retirement,” David joined the Knight Science Journalism Program at MIT and edited The New York Times Book of Science.
David was a Renaissance man—a phrase he’d probably reject, but so be it. Besides all the foregoing, he was a published poet, jazz lover, avid runner, foodie and baseball fan (except for the designated hitter).
Don Colburn ’69