Stephanie Jo Salter

Hoosier writer Stephanie Jo Salter, who charmed us with her wit and challenged us with her prose, died April 15, 2026, following a brief illness from a very rare, aggressive cancer. She was 76 years old. 

The eldest child of Morris and Patty (Cunningham) Salter, Stephanie was born Nov. 11, 1949, at Vincennes. She grew up in Terre Haute in a close-knit family that included one sibling, sister Debbie. Her lifelong love of the arts began with childhood dance lessons in ballet, tap and jazz. Stephanie was proud of her public-school education in Terre Haute. She graduated from Garfield High School, where as a cheerleader she championed her Purple Eagles. 

College would prove transformative for her. Through the study of journalism at Purdue, Stephanie found her writing voice. She joined the university newspaper, the Exponent, rising in her junior year to editor-in-chief, the first woman tapped as the newspaper's leader since World War II. 

Sports Illustrated in New York City hired Stephanie upon her graduation in 1971. In recalling her time at SI, for a story upon her May 2019 enshrinement into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame, she noted: “As a lowly fact checker, I learned about great writing by working intimately with the words of some of the best wordsmiths. I learned the rhythm and melody of excellent writing.” 

A mere four years later, the young journalist left for the West Coast, settling in San Francisco, where she would freelance for a year before joining the sports staff of the Examiner newspaper. Her reporting on the Golden State Warriors and Oakland A's earned her the national Mary Garber Woman Sportswriter of the Year award. 

A new challenge awaited Stephanie as she embraced news reporting, bringing her talents to bear as a general assignment and education reporter for the Examiner and later the Chronicle, following the newspapers' merger. In 1985, Stephanie began weaving her words into commentary replete with liberal perspectives. She researched, then wrote columns that informed while serving as calls to action, often seeking to elevate people oppressed by their circumstances. 

Her columns became legendary across 16 years of publication in the City by the Bay. “Steph was the journalist’s journalist, the writer’s writer," former Examiner and Chronicle colleague Joan Ryan stated in Stephanie's Hall of Fame biography. "She was fearless and elegant, analytical and homespun. Refrigerators all over the Bay Area had her columns taped to them. What set Steph’s column apart was deep empathy and clear-eyed focus on the people nobody sees: the poor, the marginalized, the dismissed.” 

Stephanie's ability to lay out compelling arguments through her writing was masterful. Women's rights and human rights were the backbone of her staunch advocacy. 

She earned numerous national honors, including Planned Parenthood's Susan B. Anthony Media Award, and she was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for her work on a special edition about the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. In 1994, she won the Bay Area Society for Professional Journalists award for Best Investigative Reporting for her work unearthing financial corruption and clergy sex abuse in the San Francisco Archdiocese of the Catholic Church. 

Stephanie left her beloved San Francisco in 2004, returning to Terre Haute to care for ailing parents. She would soon join the staff of the Tribune-Star, leading deep-dive, enterprise reporting and serving as assistant editor for Opinion. Thoughtful, fearless and entertaining, her columns resonated with readers in the Wabash Valley and beyond. State and national press groups feted her again and again for insightful work that inspired introspection and action. 

Stephanie's friendships, too, were substantial. She forged unbreakable ties to those with whom she connected, from childhood chums to journalism pals and her Lake Ladies gaggle, whose laughter echoed across a private Parke County lake on warm summer nights. She savored a glass of dry wine and enjoyed tossing together a meal in the kitchen with friends. Enough of a foodie to appreciate the inspiration of fine chefs, she never lost her love for a good Indiana tenderloin sandwich. 

The independent, devout feminist remained single until love blossomed with Bill Fenoglio, a widowed business executive who also grew up in Terre Haute, and who was the brother-in-law of her sister, Debbie. After long careers elsewhere, they both had navigated back to Terre Haute and were surprised and delighted to find each other. On paper, it was an unlikely pairing, the staunch Republican and the liberal Democrat. 

Stephanie was amused to be a first-time bride at 61. The couple married May 14, 2011, a day she would later recall as one of the happiest in her life, at St. Mary-of-the-Woods. They shared nearly 13 years together until Bill's death in March 2024. The couple lived in Stephanie's cherished historic Collett Park neighborhood, enjoyed winters in Scottsdale, Ariz., and later moved to a home overlooking Traders Point Lake at Indianapolis, to be near family. 

While she never had children of her own, Stephanie shared a close bond with her nieces. From deep conversations and collaborations to joint adventures and uproarious laughter, they relished time together.

A voracious reader, Stephanie subscribed to several publications, including the New York Times, noting, "I subsidized my news consumption with every subscription I could pay for." She understood the importance of factual, in-depth reporting and believed her life's work to be our lifeline to democracy. 

Operas resonated with Stephanie, as a patron and on stage; she performed as an extra in 28 different productions with the San Francisco Opera. Back home, she enthusiastically supported the Terre Haute Symphony Orchestra as well as the Swope Art Museum. 

Classical music provided the background for her daily movement. She liked to putter with plants, a straw hat adorning her blond/gray thatch, work gloves masking the fingers that had virtuosic sway over keyboards, a learned skill that evolved from two-finger typing. 

Her fondness for baseball kept Stephanie rooting for the Chicago Cubs and San Francisco Giants. She enjoyed traveling, with beaches filling many of her itineraries along with trips to northern California, where she found "one of the most beautiful stretches of geography in the world." She visited Italy eight times, and had an affinity for Venice. 

Scarves were her signature fashion statement, adding panache to the plain. She seldom went anywhere without eyewear, sunglasses and eyeglasses, with "cheaters" handy for extra focus. 

Stephanie's humor, often self-deprecating as she navigated life's peaks and pitfalls, was central to her being. She was unwilling to bask alone in the limelight, preferring to share it with mentors and colleagues. Her strength was rooted in Midwestern values from which sprang empathy, and the determination to act on it. Through her words, Stephanie moved as a whirlwind for change, picking us up and carrying us to a better place. 

Age failed to slow her activism. In September, she rallied with fellow Hoosiers at the Indiana Statehouse to protest proposed early redistricting. And Oct. 18 found her at a No Kings rally, joining millions of protesters around the world. She wrote on Facebook: "Today I joined thousands of Hoosiers at the state capitol to peacefully exercise our 1st Amendment rights. To those of you who disagree with this movement but you know me, I ask only that you please accept that I am no terrorist, I wasn’t paid and I sure as hell don’t hate America. In fact, the best part of the day was singing our National Anthem with the entire crowd. It IS ours, after all." A photo from the rally showed her bedecked in a straw hat and big sunglasses, flashing the peace sign. 

Stephanie had a deep connection to the Sisters of Providence of St. Mary-of-the-Woods, whose activism and spiritual faith mirrored her own. A convert to Catholicism, she relished the mindfulness found among the Sisters at The Woods, a place of peace. 

As she neared the end of her life on earth, Stephanie took great comfort in the words of her spiritual adviser: "Step out of the circle of time, and into the circle of love." 

Stephanie is survived by her sister, Deborah Salter-Fenoglio (David Fenoglio); aunt, Linda Cunningham-Sayre; nieces and nephews, Natalee Manwarring (Derek Wagner), Piper Roche (Matthew Roche, daughter Audrey Roche), Haley Manwarring (son Otto Arreguin), Brian Fenoglio (Kathleen Fenoglio, sons Caleb Fenoglio and Jesse Fenoglio), Amy Fenoglio (Lee Pannier); her husband's children, Denise Fenoglio, Todd Fenoglio (Judy Fenoglio), William Fenoglio Jr. (Kimberly Fenoglio); and many Salter and Cunningham cousins. 

She was preceded in death by her parents, Patty Cunningham-Salter and Morris Salter, and her husband, William Fenoglio.  

A celebration of life is planned for May 30 in the Church of the Immaculate Conception at St. Mary-of-the-Woods. Doors will open at 10 a.m. followed by a Mass of Christian Burial at 11. The service will be available via livestream at spsmw.org for those unable to attend. 

Interment will be in the columbarium at Providence Community Cemetery, St. Mary-of-the-Woods, where family and friends will share in a time of reflection at noon. 

Memorial contributions may be made in honor of Stephanie to the Sisters of Providence of St. Mary-of-the-Woods.

Arrangements entrusted to Distinctive Cremation.

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