Mike Newell, a longtime producer at Iowa Public Television, died Thursday night (Dec. 1) at Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines, after suffering a heart attack the previous week and undergoing surgery on Nov. 29, reports the Des Moines Register. He was 66.
“Iowa Public Television’s public affairs series Iowa Press lost its leader this week when longtime coordinating producer Mike Newell passed away,” the station said on its website. “For the past 20 years, Mike’s hands were at the helm of this program, steering a steady course through the sometimes murky waters of public policy and politics. While you never heard his voice on Iowa Press, he was undoubtedly the heart and soul of the program.”
Newell had worked full time for the pubTV station since 2003, according to the Register, and freelanced for the network since the 1980s, producing stories for its rural business program, Market to Market.
Newell had a mild heart attack at age 49, which prompted a change in his daily schedule. Until then, he told a Register columnist after that health crisis, Newell would awaken at at 3:40 a.m. and to the office by 5. “I’d have three cups of coffee and three cigarettes before I put my underwear on,” Newell said; he’d work until after midnight, and do it all again the next day.
He is survived by his wife Chris and two daughters. Visitation will be 4 to 8 p.m. Monday at Dunn’s Funeral Home (2121 Grand Ave., Des Moines) and a funeral service will be at 11 a.m. Tuesday at St. Augustine’s Catholic Church.
Michael, as a young man from a large Irish family, Saint Sebastians Milwaukee was loved. He was a kind and spirited young man . He was my brother’s friend.
Our love and sympathy to the family, Maureen (O’Neill) Hilbert and Bill. PS He spoke so eloquently at Kevin’s funeral.