Le Monde Founder Hubert Beuve-Mery Dies at Age 87

PARIS — Hubert Beuve-Mery, who founded Le Monde in 1944 and made it France’s leading daily newspaper, has died at the age of 87, the newspaper announced today.

Beuve-Mery died Sunday night in Fontainebleau, where he had been hospitalized for the last week after a serious fall, Le Monde said.

“He was a great leader,” Jacques Fauvet, Beuve-Mery’s successor as editor and publisher of Le Monde, said on French radio. “He had great independence of spirit and moral authority at the same time.”

The austere, left-of-center tabloid, its gray expanses only rarely broken by photographs, became known for its authoritative and thorough coverage of foreign and domestic affairs, complete with footnotes in tiny print.