Haynes, Steve

Steve Haynes was born in Lawrence, Kan., in 1948 and graduated from the University of Kansas in 1970 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Journalism. He was a circulation clerk, reporter and editor for The Kansas City Times from 1968 to 1980.

A long-time publisher in Kansas and Colorado, he has been president of the Colorado (1988) and Kansas (1998) state press associations and the National Newspaper Association (2007-8), serving on the national board for 12 years. He is a licensed lay worship minister in the Episcopal Church and likes to fish, ride and watch trains, and walk.

In 1971, he and Cynthia Desilet married in Concordia, Kan. Born in that city, she graduated from KU in 1971 with a Bachelor of Pharmacy degree. She is a registered pharmacist and a former store manager for several companies, including Dillons. She was a board member of the Colorado Pharmacists Association, and has been an independent relief pharmacist for the last 32 years.

The Hayneses met at KU, and have been partners in publishing since they bought The Mineral County Miner in Creede, Colo., in 1981. In 1993, they sold their eight newspaper in Colorado and bought three, The Oberlin Herald, The Saint Francis Herald and the Bird City Times in northwest Kansas. Through 2022, Haynes Publishing Co. grew to six newspapers and two shoppers serving six Kansas counties, including the Goodland Star-News, Norton Telegram and Colby Free Press.

In 2020, while preparing for retirement, they added the Rawlins County Square Deal in Atwood. It had closed after the retiring owners could not find a buyer, but has been vital and profitable since.

Their group also included the Country Advocate, a free-distribution shopper serving all six counties, plus two in Colorado. The couple sold the newspapers on Dec. 1, 2022.

In Kansas City, Mr. Haynes was a reporter for five years and later served as a copy editor, makeup editor and newsroom computer co-ordinator for The Times. He covered general news, labor, the new (in 1972) Kansas City International Airport and a major tornado, refinery explosions and a strike against The Star.

While in high school, he recalled, he hung out with the photographers at The Emporia Gazette, learning to work a Speed Graphic 4x5 press camera. At KU, he took the courses required for a photojournalism degree, though his major was in news.

The Hayneses have three grown children, Felicia Haynes, of Augusta, Ga., an executive and manager for a website design and service company; Lindsay Blake, an associate professor and librarian at the University of Arkansas Medical School in Little Rock; and Lacy C. Haynes, a housekeeping supervisor for the university in Lawrence; and two grandchildren, Taylor and Grayson Blake.

Steve has always been proud of two forbears influential in Kansas newspapering and Republican politics, Lacy C. Haynes Sr., longtime Kansas editor of The Star, and his brother-in-law, William A. White of The Gazette. His father, Lacy C. Haynes Jr., a World War II veteran who practiced law in Emporia, where Steve grew up.