Sargent Appointed to Fill Nieman Post

Dwight E. Sargent, editorial page editor of the New York Herald Tribune, will become Curator of the Nieman Fellowships on July 1, it was announced yesterday. Sargent succeeds Louis M. Lyons, who is retiring after 25 years as Curator.

Sargent himself studies at Harvard as a Nieman Fellow in 1950-51 and served on the Nieman selection committee in 1956. Nieman Fellowships offer outstanding newsmen a year of study at Harvard in any field useful to their journalistic work.

Sargent is not planning any professional activities outside his job as Curator. "I expect it will be a full-time job, and then some," he said yesterday. In contrast, Lyons held jobs as a reporter for the Boston Globe and a newscaster for WGBH, Boston's educational radio and television station, during his tenure.

No major innovations in the Nieman program are in the offing, Sargent said, adding that the "solid foundation" Lyons has built made any changes unnecessary. He praised Lyons' "magnificent job" in developing the Fellowships from "nothing to a universally respected institution."

Sargent was first on the University's list of desirable candidates for the post, according to Lyons. "He was the only one we asked," Lyons said.

Before joining the Herald Tribune staff in 1959, the 47-year old Colby graduate worked as editorial page editor of the Portland Press-Herald and Sunday Telegram and news director of WGAN radio in Portland, Me.