Clark Hoyt

Clark Hoyt is an American journalist who was the public editor of the New York Times, serving as the "readers' representative." He was the newspaper's third public editor, or ombudsman, after Daniel Okrent and Byron Calame. His initial two-year term began on May 14, 2007, and was later extended for another year, expiring in June 2010.

Hoyt is a member of The Hill School class of 1960 and a 1964 graduate of Columbia College of Columbia University. Hoyt began his journalism career in 1966 at the The Ledger. Shortly afterwards in 1968 he joined the American media company Knight Ridder, where he was deployed to the Detroit Free Press as a general reporter, before progressing to become a political reporter. Indeed, Hoyt would spend most of his journalism career at Knight Ridder—except for a stint at The Miami Herald as a Washington Correspondent during the 70's—until its sale to The McClatchy Company in 2006.

During the 1980s and mid-2000s, upon Hoyt's return to Knight Ridder, he filled numerous positions within the company, including business editor, managing editor,as well as news editor and chief of the Washington bureau. Hoyt also served as Vice President of News for Knight Ridder from 1993-99.

Hoyt is also a joint 1973 Pulitzer Prize winner; a prize he shares with fellow journalist Robert Boyd for their coverage of the Democratic vice presidential nominee Thomas Eagleton, and their uncovering of the electric shock treatment and powerful anti-psychotics used to treat Eagleton’s ongoing mental health problems regarding his manic depression, which Eagleton tried to keep secret from the Democratic presidential nominee George McGovern and the press.