Mark Travis, who worked as a newspaper reporter, editor and publisher, primarily at the Concord Monitor and Valley News in New Hampshire, and was a book author, died on Nov. 2, 2024, at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. He was 67 and had written openly about his long health journey on his blog “We Meet Again” after being diagnosed with leukemia in 2010.
Born in Dover, N.H., in 1957, Travis grew up in in Andover, Mass. After earning a bachelor’s degree in American history from Brown University in 1980, he was briefly a part-time reporter for the Concord Monitor before working for three years as a reporter and regional editor at the Valley News in Lebanon, N.H. In 1983, he moved south to Florida to join the St. Petersburg Times as a reporter and bureau chief.
In 1986, Travis returned to the Concord Monitor where he worked for more than two decades in roles that included reporter, editor, circulation director and director of product development. In 2008 he became publisher of the Valley News before returning to the Concord Monitor as publisher in 2013.
In 2014, he stepped away from traditional newsrooms and joined Subtext Media, a small startup in Vermont that had new ideas about how to provide local news and information. After the startup failed, he began writing for Scribe Media, where he was ghostwriter for nine books.He also edited and wrote for three nonprofits: the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation, the New Hampshire Historical Society and Kairos Earth,and he contributed to Harvard Magazine and the UNH Magazine.
Travis was a close friend and colleague of Concord Monitor editor Mike Pride, a 1985 Nieman Fellow. Together, they co-wrote“My Brave Boys: To War With Colonel Cross and the Fighting Fifth,” a history of the Fifth New Hampshire Volunteers in the Civil War. Travis later wrote “Pliney Fisk,” a mystery set in the Concord area in the post-Civil War era, and “In Union: A History of Canterbury Shaker Village.”
When Pride died in 2023, Travis wrote a lengthy tribute to his friend.
Well-liked by friends and colleagues, Travis is remembered as a gifted storyteller and for his curiosity, kindness and wise counsel and encouragement as an editor mentoring young writers. Active in his community of Canterbury, N.H., he loved sports and sports history
Travis leaves his wife Brenda, son Ben (along with wife Liz, and their children, Annabelle and Oliver), and daughter, Leanna.
A memorial service will be held on Friday Nov. 22, 2024, at 10:00 a.m. at the Canterbury United Community Church, 5 Center Rd., Canterbury, N.H. Calling hours are 2:30-4:30 p.m. and 5:30-7:30 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 21 at the Canterbury Parish Hall, 6 Hackleboro Rd. in Canterbury.
Memorial donations may be made to the renovation project for the Canterbury Community Parish House. Checks should be made out to the Canterbury United Community Church with the memo line: “IMO Mark Travis Parish House CC Renovations” and sent to the church at 5 Center Rd., Canterbury, NH 03224.
