Christian Science Monitor publisher dies at 72

? John Lewis Selover, the publisher of The Christian Science Monitor and a Christian Science Church leader who helped shepherd the church’s expansion, has died. He was 72.

Selover, of Boston, died Friday “among family, after a brief illness at home,” said Peter Osterlund, spokesman for the Christian Science Board of Directors. Osterlund said the family declined to specify the nature of the illness.

Selover was elected to the board of directors in 1985 and later became the board’s vice chairman. In 1998, he became the manager of The Christian Science Publishing Society, which publishes the daily newspaper in Boston.

During his tenure as publisher, the newspaper won a Pulitzer Prize for its political cartoons, and expanded and redesigned its Web site to increase online readership fivefold, editor Paul Van Slambrouck said.

Calling him “an editor’s dream publisher,” Van Slambrouck remembered Selover’s fearlessness and enthusiasm.

“He was just fiercely protective of the paper’s independence; he was very encouraging of bringing diverse views onto the op-ed page,” he said. “But at the end of the day, he made it fun. For all the seriousness we see in the business every day, he saw no reason it shouldn’t be fun.”

The Monitor plans to run an appreciation of Selover’s life in Monday’s editions, Osterlund said. The newspaper does not have an obituary page.

He is survived by his wife, Elizabeth, a daughter and son, two grandchildren and a brother. A memorial service was being planned for the end of August.