AUBURN - Polly Ouimet, a longtime news editor at the Sun Journal, died Friday of cancer at home with her family by her side. She was 76.

Born in Lewiston and raised in Auburn, Ouimet began her career with the Sun Journal in 1966, working in the newsroom's state department, which gathered and reported news from western Maine. In 1976, she was promoted to news director of suburban and regional news, breaking a barrier for women. She also helped scores of journalists get their start.

Ouimet became the features editor and assistant to the managing editor in 1994, and retired in 1996. After retirement, she continued to work on a freelance basis until 2002, but her interest in news never waned. She monitored the police scanner from home and called in news tips until her health prevented it.

Later this year, Ouimet will be inducted into the Maine Press Association's Hall of Fame, an honor reserved for those with lifetime achievement in journalism.

"She was an amazing woman and the most thoroughly devoted news person," her daughter, Heather McCarthy, said Friday. McCarthy, a Sun Journal news editor, said her mother was always on duty.

"She was always looking for stories. She always covered what needed to be covered. She believed people deserved to know the news, and know now."

Sun Journal publisher James Costello Sr. said of Ouimet, "She was just a wonderful person and so dedicated, and not just to the Sun Journal. She was really dedicated to get all the news out of her area that she possibly could. What really irritated her was if she missed something."

For Ouimet, it was personal, Costello said. "She just got so excited. All those correspondents just thrived" under her leadership and responded to her.

One of Ouimet's greatest achievements was as regional news director. When she was promoted to that post in 1976, there were no women in news management except those who worked on the social page.

Ouimet paved the way for women, including Managing Editor Judy Meyer. She met Ouimet in 1985 when Meyer answered an ad for freelance correspondents.

"My first assignment was to cover the annual Labor Day community events in Buckfield, where I live," Meyer said. "She coached my nerves through that assignment, and then on to cover selectmen's meetings and school committee meetings, providing wisdom and support."

As regional news director, Ouimet amassed a legion of freelancers to ensure coverage throughout the paper's circulation area. At one point, Ouimet had more than 100 freelance writers working for her.

In an age before computers and digital photos, on Sundays and holidays she and her husband, Henry Ouimet, drove more than 100 miles to pick up correspondents' film and hard-copy stories, and delivered them to the newsroom for Monday's paper.

Charlie Pomerleau, now city editor for the Standard-Examiner in Ogden, Utah, was hired by Ouimet in the 1980s. Pomerleau called Ouimet one of the most remarkable editors he's encountered.

"She covered a geographic area larger than some states, managing somehow to coordinate a long list of school boards, boards of selectmen, elections, planning commissioners and county commissioners, as well as spot news coverage of fires, accidents, murders, lost kids and hunters," Pomerleau said. She did all that "with a smoldering cigarette dangling from her lips, at least until smoking was banned in the newsroom."

A petite woman who wore her hair in a bun, Ouimet was determined and resourceful in newsgathering.

"It was something to see, hear and be part of," said night news editor Mary Delamater. "She used every reporter at her disposal, in every community in western Maine, at every hour of the day and night to bring the events, both small and large, to every reader every day."

Ouimet raised her daughter while covering stories or overseeing news coverage. McCarthy recalled being irritated as a child when she called her mother at work. "She was not always interested in listening to my yammering. She needed to call people.

"She took me with her everywhere," McCarthy said. "I went to all kinds of news events with her. It was part of my life long before I worked in journalism."

When McCarthy graduated from Bates College and followed her mother into journalism, "she was very happy. We're both extremely nosy and curious."

After Ouimet retired, she continued to listen to the police scanner and let the newsroom know of breaking stories. Every morning, breakfast table conversation involved Ouimet's critique of that day's paper, McCarthy said.

Regional editor Scott Thistle, who holds the job Ouimet performed for nearly two decades, said her legacy was "her persistence that we get the story, get the story right and whenever possible we get the story first," he said. Those values "still drive this newsroom today."