Our more than 200 members are professional writers in a variety of disciplines. Several of them are profiled here.
Dolores Plested
Member since 1945
Journalist, historical books
An honorary life member of the Denver Woman’s Press Club, Dolores “Del” Plested joined the club nearly 60 years ago (1945). A native of Trinidad, Colorado, she received her B.A. in Journalism from Colorado University and her M.A. in retailing from New York University. After a stint with the Retail Reporting Bureau, a service for department stores across the country, she became a reporter for The Midtowner, a small weekly covering New York’s west side which involved interviewing some fascinating people such as popular novelist of the time, Fannie Hurst; exotic Brazilian star Carmen Mirand; Henry Seidel Canby, editor of the Saturday Review of Literature and chairman of the board of judges for the Book-of-the-Month Club; famed Wagnerian tenor Lauritz Melchoir; Elmer Davis, New York Times and CBS radio commentator; political cartoonist Rube Goldberg and Arthur William Brown, top illustrator of the time, illustrating stories by Booth Tarkington, Scott Fitzgerald, Ring Lardner and many more.
From the Midtowner, she joined the New York Times as a reporter for their new food column, and worked there until she returned to Colorado in June 1941. In Denver she became copywriter and program director for independent radio station KMYR, then left to become Denver Bureau Chief for the New York-based Fairchild Publications business papers. For Fairchild, she covered Jackie Kennedy’s skiing vacation at Aspen along with Robert Kennedy, later Ted Kennedy and Ethel Kennedy at various Colorado ski areas.
When President Eisenhower vacationed in Denver summers of 1954 and 1955, she was assigned to cover Ike with the summer White House Press at Lowry Air Force Base, which included coverage of his last heart attack and recovery at Fitzsimons Hospital.
Besides involvements with Press Club activities, Del was co-founder of Friends of Historical Trinidad, a group made up of former residents across the country to help preserve historical treasures in their home town. In 1997 she received the Frank Kugeler award from the Colorado Historical Society for more than 35 years of service to the preservation of Trinidad’s history.
In Fall 2004, she was among those honored at the Warren Village Giving Wall where plaques carrying names of founders were unveiled. She served on the board from 1972 to 1990 of Warren Village, a unique program to help low income single parents become self sufficient.
Del is the author of The Plesteds, a family history; Life and Death of a Coal Mine, the story of her father’s mine; The History of The Howard Plested Intermediate College for Girls in Meerut, India, which her grandparents founded in memory of their son. Along The Way, a reminiscence and a booklet Amazing Minnie, the story of Minne Reynolds, founder of the Denver Woman’s Press Club.