Inducted 2025
John Flesher
correspondent, Associated Press
John Flesher spent 34 years telling Michigan’s story for The Associated Press – briefly in Washington, D.C., but mostly as a correspondent based in Traverse City. He wandered Michigan’s vast northlands, shining a light on often-neglected people, places and events for a worldwide audience.
John also was among AP’s most accomplished environmental reporters, creating a beat that yielded groundbreaking coverage of the Great Lakes and Michigan’s inland waters, farms, forests and wildlife. Government officials, advocacy groups and scientists credited his reporting with boosting public awareness and influencing policy decisions on matters as varied as the gray wolf’s resurgence, Great Lakes cleanup funding and wetlands protection.
AP’s national editors granted John the rare specialty byline title of “AP Environmental Writer.” He was among five founding reporters appointed to the news cooperative’s Global Environmental Beat Team. He received numerous honors and fellowships, including the prestigious Ted Scripps Fellowship in Environmental Journalism at the University of Colorado and a career achievement award from the Great Lakes Commission.
Raised mostly in North Carolina, John graduated from North Carolina State University, where he was editor of the student newspaper. After a year with his hometown paper, the Goldsboro News-Argus, he joined the AP bureau in Raleigh. He became chief statehouse reporter, covering the governor, legislature, state elections and national political conventions, before transferring to Washington in 1989 as AP’s Michigan regional reporter.
A few years later he became Traverse City correspondent, responsible for the Upper Peninsula and the northern Lower Peninsula – roughly half of Michigan. He was the archetypal AP jack-of- all-trades, whether phoning in details from a tornado scene or court trial, interpreting exit poll results on election night, using computer-assisted data analysis for investigative environmental projects or shooting high-quality photos and video clips.
He went anywhere the story led, from a submarine at the bottom of Lake Superior to a bush plane buzzing above Isle Royale. He reported from islands, beaches, laboratories, mine shafts, power plants, factory farms, forests and swamps. He climbed aboard fishing and ferry boats, cargo ships and barges, canoes and kayaks, research vessels, icebreakers and snowmobiles.
And he gave generously to his profession, leading writing and reporting seminars for newspapers, mentoring young reporters and speaking at schools.
John retired from his 43-year career in 2023. He and his wife, Sharon Perkinson Flesher, divide their time between Michigan and North Carolina. They have two grown children, Dylan and Leah.