Paul Fisher

Paul Fisher was director of the University of Missouri Freedom of Information Center for 31 years, retiring in 1989. A protégé of Earl English, the center’s founder, Fisher worked with English to persuade Missouri senators to vote for FOIA legislation.

As head of the center, he established freedom of information as an academic study and opened the Washington office of the university’s FOI Center. He hired Samuel J. Archibald as the first Washington director. He also taught a number of groundbreaking courses on the subject of FOI, courses one former student credits as “the best I ever had in undergrad or graduate school, courses which made me look behind the news, at peoples’ motivations.”

Fisher died March 17, 2009.