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Longtime St. Louis journalist and Riverfront Times founder Ray Hartmann dies in car crash 18%
By Chad Davis0% Jason Rosenbaum0%
4/24/2026, 5:11:32 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 6 faulty reasoning types, including Halo Effect, In-Group Bias, and Politically Left Leaning Bias, with Biased Writer Voice as the most egregious example at 16.6% saturation with 72 hits. Analysis detected 258 faulty-reasoning hits from 433 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 33.3% and a BS Rank of 18% (13,849 of 16,813 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 82.40% of the article peer group.
A longtime voice of St.
Louis, a journalism pioneer, a political candidate and news personality, Ray Hartmann has died.
He was 73.
Friends of Hartmann said he was killed Thursday afternoon in a car accident on Interstate 64.
A spokesperson for the Missouri State Highway Patrol confirmed the fatal accident on Interstate 64 near Interstate 270.
Highway Patrol officials couldn’t disclose the identity of the victim but said it was a two-vehicle crash in which two tires came off a semitruck, with one striking a vehicle.
The driver, Hartmann, was pronounced dead shortly thereafter at Mercy Hospital.
The Highway Patrol said the driver of the semi is cooperating with authorities.
Hartmann grew up in St.
Louis County.
He graduated from Parkway Central High School and the University of Missouri-Columbia Journalism School, eventually going to work as a speechwriter for then-Gov.
Kit Bond.
“I did such a spectacular job in that role that the voters picked Joe Teasdale [in 1976] and sent us home,” said Hartmann during a 2024 interview.
For decades, Hartmann had his finger on the pulse of St.
Louis.
In 1977, he founded the alt-weekly newspaper the Riverfront Times.
He sold the paper in 1998.
“It was never the same after he left,” former Riverfront Times reporter and former St.
Louis Magazine Editor-in-Chief Jeannette Cooperman said.
“He had such integrity.
He gave us a lot of freedom, a lot of trust.”
Cooperman said Hartmann was a fearless journalist who wasn’t afraid to ruffle feathers, even if it meant losing advertisers.
He was also shy in public.
She and Hartmann would cross paths professionally just a few years later.
He relaunched St.
Louis Magazine, where Cooperman became editor-in-chief.
“He questioned power,” Cooperman said.
“Ray stayed honest, and he called people into account.”
Hartmann sold St.
Louis Magazine in 2018.
He was a frequent pundit voice on Nine PBS’ "Donnybrook" for almost 40 years, using his wit and liberal political views to spar with the show’s more conservative panelists, before leaving in 2024 to run as a Democrat for Missouri’s 2nd Congressional District seat against Republican Rep.
Ann Wagner.
“Our politics are broken, and Congress is broken,” Hartmann said during a 2024 episode of “Politically Speaking.”
“And I've been in the public eye for a long time, and I just felt this was the time to step up.”
Wagner defeated Hartmann by roughly 12 percentage points.
After the 2024 election cycle, Hartmann continued his political analysis through his Substack.
Hartmann is survived by his wife, Kerri, and two children.
Analysis
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