AUGUSTA – David B. Offer, executive editor of the Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel, will retire this December, the newspaper announced Wednesday.

“I’ve had a wonderful, 41-year career in journalism – including five great years working with a talented staff here – but now it’s time to do other things,” said Offer, who turned 65 last week.

Offer’s leadership “markedly improved our newspapers, from the coverage of hard news to enterprise reporting to the opinion pages,” Publisher John Christie said.

In Maine, the Seattle native won his second Allan B. Rogers award for editorial writing as well as the Yankee Quill, which is given by the New England Society of Newspaper Editors for lifetime achievement. The Yankee Quill will be presented to Offer in November in Boston.

Offer began his reporting career at the Wenatchee (Wash.) Daily World in 1966 and moved a year later to The Hartford Courant, where he won a fellowship that he used to earn a master’s degree in political science from the University of California at Berkeley.

Offer is past president of the New England Associated Press News Executives Association and a former director and national treasurer of the Associated Press Managing Editors Association. He also served four times as a juror for the Pulitzer Prize.