National Press Club Elects Mark Hamrick 104th President

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Dec 10, 2010, 09:27 ET

-- Veteran Associated Press Broadcaster to Focus on the Club's Growth and Diversity During 2011 Term --

WASHINGTON, Dec. 10, 2010 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The National Press Club, the world's leading professional organization for journalists, announced today its membership has elected Associated Press broadcast journalist Mark Hamrick as its 104th president. Hamrick, who formerly served as the Club's Vice President, will be sworn in during a black tie inaugural gala on January 29, 2011.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20080917/NPCLOGO )

Since joining the National Press Club in 1996, Hamrick has served the organization in many capacities including Board Chair, Membership Secretary, and most recently Vice President. He also was the founding Chairman of the Club's Broadcast Committee. In his new role as President, Hamrick will focus on member retention and recruitment with an emphasis on diversity during his 2011 term in office.

"We will make a concerted effort to reach out to professionals who might not have thought seriously of joining the National Press Club in the past," said Hamrick. "The breathtakingly rapid pace of change in journalism, and communications in general, means that there's never been a greater need for professional development, social networking in the real world and collaboration. The NPC is the place for all of that and much more."

Hamrick is a national business and financial news journalist for the Associated Press in Washington, D.C., where he has worked for nearly 25 years. Having reported on both bull and bear markets and, most recently, the Great Recession, his work encompasses video, radio and text. Mark has won numerous national honors and awards for his outstanding reporting and anchoring in spot news, documentary and newscast categories.

Prior to his first position as a radio reporter and anchor for the Associated Press in Dallas, Hamrick worked in Buffalo, New York as a news anchor at WBEN-AM, WNED-TV, and all-news WEBR-AM radio station. At WBEN, he also provided traffic reports from a helicopter.

Hamrick attended the University of Kansas, where he also worked at KANU-FM in Lawrence. As a broadcast journalism student, he appeared on public television stations interviewing newsmakers including Donald Rumsfeld and Ralph Nader. He began his broadcasting career at KGGF-AM in Coffeyville, Kansas.

Hamrick and his wife Jeanne live in Potomac, Maryland. Their son, Christopher, is a freshman at Villanova University.

The 2011 inaugural celebration, "We're Not in Kansas Anymore," will pay homage to Hamrick's Midwestern roots. Food and wine from his native Kansas and his adopted home state of Maryland will be served, special guests, including Hamrick's fellow former Kansan, broadcast legend Bill Kurtis, will be on hand for the celebration.

The event will be held in the National Press Club's ballroom at 6:30 p.m. on January 29, 2011. Tickets are $95 and can be purchased by calling the Club at 202-662-7501.

The National Press Club, founded in 1908, has 3400 members comprised of journalists and communications professionals in Washington and worldwide. Widely known for its Speakers Luncheon Series regularly televised live by C-SPAN and aired on other broadcast outlets, the NPC also is Washington's most frequently used venue for news conferences. The NPC is committed to the future of journalism and conducts an aggressive program of professional education for journalists, funds scholarships for aspiring journalists, operates the nation's only non-academic research library for journalists, and is committed to the promotion of free press worldwide.

SOURCE National Press Club