Gainesville Sun
June 5, 2006
Joe Halberstein
Joe Halberstein of Levittown, Pa., died May 29 of natural causes. He was 83.
Mr. Halberstein grew up in St. Marys, Ohio, and lived in several cities including Gainesville before moving to Pennsylvania in 1975. He was a retired newspaper columnist and a former Gainesville Sun editor.
Mr. Halberstein worked in Gainesville from 1955 to 1971, first as a news wire editor and then as a sports editor. Most recently, he was a columnist for the Bucks County Courier Times outside of Philadelphia.
He also worked for the Star-News in Wilmington, N.C.; the New York City weekly, Town and Village; and two Ohio newspapers, the Lima News and the Columbus Citizen. He had a bachelor\'s degree in journalism from The Ohio State University, where he was sports editor for the campus newspaper during his college years.
He had a noted talent for conveying the emotions of the people he wrote about and relating to his readers.
\"Joe was just a throwback to the golden days where it was OK for a reporter to get involved. He spoke the voice of the average reader. He touched a lot of people,\" former Courier Times publisher Arthur Mayhew told the Courier Times.