Exec helped merge Knight Ridder in ’74

Alvah H. Chapman Jr., 87, the former president of the Miami Herald who helped arrange the 1974 merger of Knight Newspapers and Ridder Publications, died Thursday at his home in Miami of pneumonia after battling Parkinson’s disease.

Chapman became president of the Herald in 1969 and, after the merger, was named chief executive of the Knight Ridder Inc. chain of 30 newspapers. He held the post until 1989. Under his tenure, Knight Ridder’s revenue tripled and its newspapers won 33 Pulitzer Prizes.

He also was active in philanthropy and public service in Miami. He worked to house the homeless, helped sculpt downtown Miami’s contemporary appearance and led the group We Will Rebuild after Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

Chapman was born March 21, 1921, in Columbus, Ga. At the Citadel, the South Carolina military college, Chapman became regimental commander, the school’s top cadet. He served in the Army Air Forces during World War II.

He got his start in newspapers at the Bradenton Evening Herald in Florida, where his father was publisher, and worked at the Ledger-Enquirer in Columbus, Ga. He later became executive vice president and general manager of the St. Petersburg Times in Florida and publisher of the Savannah Morning News and Evening Press.

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Lark Previn, an adopted daughter of actress Mia Farrow, died Christmas Day at New York Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn, N.Y. She was 35. Previn, born in Vietnam in 1973, was one of three children adopted by Farrow and her then-husband, conductor Andre Previn.