Bill Keller is The Marshall Project’s first editor-in-chief.
Keller worked for The New York Times from 1984 to 2014 as a correspondent, editor and, most recently, as an Op-Ed columnist. From July 2003 until September 2011, he was the executive editor of The Times. During his eight years in that role, The Times sustained and built its newsgathering staff, winning 18 Pulitzer Prizes, and expanded its audience by adapting the newsroom to the journalistic potential of the Internet. The newsroom also participated in the creation of a digital subscription plan to help secure the company’s economic future.
Before becoming executive editor, Keller had spent two years as an Op-Ed columnist and senior writer for The New York Times Magazine. He served as managing editor from 1997 to 2001, and as foreign editor from 1995 to 1997.
As chief of The Times bureau in Johannesburg from April 1992 until May 1995, he covered the end of white rule in South Africa. From December 1986 to October 1991, Keller was a Times correspondent in Moscow, reporting on the easing and ultimate collapse of Communist rule and the breakup of the Soviet Union. In 1989, he won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage.
Before coming to The Times, Keller was a reporter for The Dallas Times Herald, the Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report in Washington and The Portland Oregonian.
Keller graduated from Pomona College with a B.A. degree in 1970 and is a member of the college’s board of trustees. He lives in New York with his wife, Emma Gilbey Keller, and their daughters, Molly and Alice.