La Jolla resident honored as a Father of the Year

La Jolla resident Jim Fitzpatrick, owner, CEO and publisher of San Diego Magazine, will be honored with a Father of the Year award by the American Diabetes Association (ADA) at a dinner on June 6. 

Fitzpatrick and wife Jan, who have lived in La Jolla since 1996, have been married since 1968. They have three children and six grandchildren, including twin boys. They met in high school. They both attended Lutheran North High School in Chicago, where Jim was the captain of the football team and Jan was a homecoming queen. Their first date was on New Year’s Eve, Dec. 31, 1965.  

After Fitzpatrick served as a pilot in the U.S. Air Force, the family settled in Orange County, where Fitzpatrick worked in sales with several companies. Then, in 1986, Fitzpatrick acquired an ownership interest in Entrepreneur Magazine, headquartered in Irvine, and served as publisher for four years. In November 1994, he acquired San Diego Magazine from founders Ed and Gloria Self. He sold the magazine to Curtco Media, publishers of the Robb Report, in 2005, and subsequently reacquired the magazine in 2010.  

He received the 2000 Ernest & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award for his success with San Diego Magazine, and a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007 from the City & Regional Magazine Association. He launched the magazine’s website, which is now available on the Apple newsstand. He has been active on boards and committees of many local civic organizations, including the San Diego Symphony, Lincoln Club, San Diego Sports Commission, San Diego Bowl Game Association and Better Business Bureau. He is the former chair of the Salvation Army Community Advisory Board Sierra Del Mar Division.  

The Father of the Year Awards program, presented by the Father’s Day Council and benefiting the American Diabetes Association, honors fathers in the U.S. who have demonstrated the ability to balance their personal lives, serve as role models of strength, commitment and love for their children and help make positive contributions to their communities, according to Nicole Parker Eades, ADA manager with the San Diego office. The New York-based Father’s Day Council, which began the awards in 1942, designated the ADA as its charity partner in 1999. The San Diego ADA chapter began its Father of the Year awards in 2004. 

The ADA will host its 10th annual Father of the Year Awards beginning at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, June 6, at Hyatt Regency La Jolla, 3777 La Jolla Village Dr., San Diego. Tickets begin at $300 per person. For more information, contact Eades at the ADA’s San Diego office, at (619) 234-9897, ext. 7438, or visit www.diabetes.org/SanDiegoFOTY.