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Don Digilio was employed at the Las Vegas Review-Journal for more than 20 years, working his way up from reporter and columnist to become the paper’s top editor in 1969. According to the Online Nevada Encyclopedia, Digilio “returned stability” to the Review-Journal newsroom during his tenure as editor.
“Don fit the times in Las Vegas perfectly,” said fellow Nevada Newspaper Hall of Fame member and former Review-Journal journalist Tim Dahlberg. “He was the editor of the paper but he was also the face of the paper and a mover and shaker in a town where moving and shaking was an art form. He wrote about the news of the day in his columns, of course, but what he excelled at was being funny in print.”
Digilio’s career at the Review-Journal ended in 1980, when he was forced to leave after he was offered stock options in a casino that was never built. He later resurrected his newspaper column in both the Valley Times and the Las Vegas Sun, where he originally began his career as a reporter after arriving in Las Vegas in 1958.
He was president of the Nevada Press Association in 1976-77.
When he was at the Review-Journal, Digilio’s relationship with Frank Sinatra, Las Vegas’ then-most famous denizen, was so fraught his friends had to arrange a “peace talk” in Sinatra’s dressing room at Caesars Palace. Digilio was the first to report in July 1966, that Sinatra was marrying Mia Farrow, and later broke the story about the singer’s sudden departure from his most famous haunt, the Sands, and the tantrum and fisticuffs that precipitated it.
He was born in Omaha, Neb., where his father ran two cigar stores and pool halls. After graduating from the Univ. of Nebraska in 1956, he served with the Eighth Army in post-war Korea, then was transferred to Tokyo, where he worked for Stars and Stripes.
More on Don Digilio:
Former Review-Journal journalist enjoyed wild ride, Las Vegas Review-Journal
