Dean Peerman, a Century editor for 60 years, dies at age 87
In March 1965, he and fellow editor Martin E. Marty participated in the second civil rights march in Selma, Alabama.
Since 1959 virtually every sentence published by the Christian Century has benefited from the wisdom and editorial judgment of Dean Peerman. He died March 26 in Chicago at age 87.
His 60 years with the Century included stints as managing editor, senior editor, and, most recently, contributing editor. He wrote countless signed and unsigned editorials, articles, and reviews for the magazine, and mentored several generations of copy editors. He was the keeper of the magazine’s manual of style and the repository of its institutional memory.
A native of Benton, Illinois, Peerman graduated from Northwestern University and Yale Divinity School before beginning his career as an editor and journalist. His editing was a model of tact and care. One of his earliest assignments for the Century was to copyedit Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” which the Century was the first national publication to print in its entirety. When asked what it was like to edit King’s essay, he would say only that he was glad the editors of the book version chose to use his rendition.
