Charles Robinson III, an award-winning journalist who covered stories across TV, radio and print for decades, died Monday afternoon at age 69, according to an executive at Maryland Public Television, his most recent workplace.

Robinson had a storied career that took him across the United States, from Florida to Ohio and eventually back to his Baltimore roots. Travis Mitchell, senior vice president and chief content officer at Maryland Public Television, said Robinson was a well-known figure in the state who had covered nearly every sector.

“People trusted him to be fair and to be accurate,” said Mitchell, adding that his coverage of minority communities, especially the African American community, was “pretty legendary.”

Robinson held several leadership positions in the National Association for Black Journalists and was considered a mentor in his newsrooms, including to Mitchell himself, he said.

Gov. Wes Moore said on X that he was “heartbroken” to learn of Robinson’s passing on Tuesday evening.

“He brought thoughtfulness, fairness, and joy to his work,” said Moore. “I’ll miss his voice and he will be greatly missed by all of us.”

It wasn’t immediately clear what caused Robinson’s death.

Robinson was born in Richmond, Virginia, on Oct. 20, 1956, and later raised in Baltimore. When he was a junior in high school, he delivered the Baltimore Afro-American newspaper, perhaps an early introduction to his future career.

He earned a bachelor’s degree in mass communication from Virginia Commonwealth University in 1980. Robinson had an active life on campus as a part of the swim team and student radio station, WVCW. He was a member of the Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, a historic organization for Black men, and later worked as editor of its publication, The Sphinx magazine.

After college, Robinson joined radio and TV newsrooms across the country, mostly focusing on political coverage. He had stints as an on-air reporter at WWBT-TV in Richmond; WPEC-TV in West Palm Beach, Florida; WCPO-TV in Cincinnati, Ohio; and BET as a national correspondent. Robinson joined Maryland Public Television in 2001, according to his company biography.

Robinson covered local, state and national news throughout his career, working on Maryland state politics coverage until his final days. In 2020, he helped write, produce and shoot a three-hour special for Maryland Public Television, framing the 2020 election through the lens of unresolved issues Martin Luther King Jr. raised in the ’60s.

Nancy Yamada, a reporter and longtime colleague of Robinson, said he strived “to inform and entertain others, filling in the blanks and giving his perspective on politics, history, genealogy and music.”

“I will miss his zest for life, his dedication to preserving and passing on history and the kindness he showed to others every single day,” Yamada said.

He won numerous awards over the years, including a 1991 NABJ award for his coverage of Nelson Mandela’s first trip to the United States and a NABJ Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021. Maryland Public Television honored Robinson with a Walk of Fame star for his significant on-air contributions in 2016.

When Mitchell was an editor at his student newspaper at Morgan State University, he met Robinson, who was at WEAA radio in Baltimore at the time.

“I owe a debt of gratitude for Charles in setting me on this path and for the contributions he made to my life as a journalist and a professional,” Mitchell said.

Robinson often coached young journalists coming up in the industry as a leader in NABJ and an adjunct professor at Howard Community College and Morgan State University. At NABJ, he was president of the Baltimore Chapter of NABJ’s Association of Black Media Workers and then an NABJ director for the mid-Atlantic region.

Jackie Jones, dean of the School of Global Journalism & Communication at Morgan, said Robinson was an old-school journalist who was excited to teach the next generation. He’d spontaneously take students on trips to Annapolis to introduce them to Maryland’s political leaders, she said.

“Charles was a force of nature,” Jones said, adding that he was constantly pushing his students to be better writers and reporters.

The longtime reporter settled in Baltimore County later in life. He is survived by his wife, Robbie, and two children.