In addition to supporting the DePorres Club, Brown used her role as publisher to persuade advertisers to accept African Americans in more positions, and her coverage of civil rights activism and riots during the 1960s earned her commendations from President Lyndon Johnson.
“The newspaper was always the communications mechanism for our community. If it happened, it was in The Omaha Star,” remembers Terri Sanders, current owner and publisher of The Omaha Star. “The one thing about The Omaha Star is that it’s the good newspaper—no police chases, no fires, it’s all about the good news of our community. Back then, and even now, that [news] is few and far between.”
Continuing the tradition of Black woman-led leadership, Sanders served as interim publisher for the newspaper while on the board for the Mildred D. Brown Memorial Study Center through the height of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, ensuring that the paper never missed a weekly publication in its 87-year history. She later purchased the paper outright through her Omaha Star Institute nonprofit in 2023. Under her tenure, the paper has grown its readership from 700 to approximately 2,500 subscribers.
