Lockhart Steele is an American blogger best known for the ''

Curbed Curbed is an American real estate and urban design website published by ''New York'' magazine. Founded as a blog by Lockhart Steele in 2006 to cover New York City real estate, it grew by 2010 to feature sub-pages dedicated to specific real ...

'' family of real estate, restaurant, and shopping news sites.

Early life and career

Lockhart Steele was raised in

Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts Manchester-by-the-Sea (also known simply as Manchester, its name prior to 1990) is a coastal town on Cape Ann, in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. The town is known for scenic beaches and vista points. According to the 2020 populati ...

. He graduated from St. Paul's School in 1992 and later, from

Brown University Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...

. In his senior year, he self-published a compendium of the band

Phish Phish is an American rock band formed in Burlington, Vermont, in 1983. The band consists of guitarist Trey Anastasio, bassist Mike Gordon, drummer Jon Fishman, and keyboardist Page McConnell, all of whom perform vocals, with Anastasio being the ...

—''The Pharmer's Almanac''—with a classmate. It became a bible for the band's international followers and printed five editions before selling to

Penguin Press Penguin Group is a British trade book publisher and part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by the German media conglomerate Bertelsmann. The new company was created by a merger that was finalised on 1 July 2013, with Bertelsmann initiall ...

. Steele moved to the

Lower East Side The Lower East Side, sometimes abbreviated as LES, is a historic neighborhood in the southeastern part of Manhattan in New York City. It is located roughly between the Bowery and the East River from Canal to Houston streets. Historically, it w ...

of Manhattan in February 2001 and built a personal blog with short news on New York's social scene. Within three years, his site was popular mainly for its New York real estate posts on apartments and restaurants, with 3,000 daily page views. He moved these posts to

.com in May 2004 and by early next year, left his job at the real estate magazine '' Cottages & Gardens'', where he was an editor, to pursue blogging. He became managing editor at

Gawker Media Gawker Media LLC (formerly Blogwire, Inc. and Gawker Media, Inc.) was an American internet media company and Link farm#Blog network, blog network. It was founded by Nick Denton in October 2003 as Blogwire, and was based in New York City. Incorpor ...

, which was known for its successful blogging business model, and managed its 11 blogs, including its New York and Washington media gossip sites. Steele eventually split Curbed's restaurant posts to Eater.com (2005) and shopping posts to Racked.com (2007).

Vox Media Vox Media, Inc. is an American mass media company founded in Washington, D.C. with operational headquarters in Lower Manhattan, New York City. The company was established in November 2011 by CEO Jim Bankoff and Trei Brundrett to encompass ''S ...

purchased Steele's sites in late 2013 for an undisclosed price between $20 and 30 million in cash and stock.

Sexual harassment allegations

Steele was fired from his job as Vox Media's Editorial Director in October 2017, over allegations of

sexual harassment Sexual harassment is a type of harassment based on the sex or gender of a victim. It can involve offensive sexist or sexual behavior, verbal or physical actions, up to bribery, coercion, and assault. Harassment may be explicit or implicit, wit ...

. The firing occurred several days after former Vox Media employee Eden Rohatensky published a post on ''

Medium.com Medium is an American online publishing platform for written content such as articles and blogs, developed by Evan Williams and launched in August 2012. It is owned by A Medium Corporation. The platform is an example of social journalism, hav ...

'' describing being sexually harassed by a supervisor. Although Rohatensky did not name the company or the people involved in the post, Vox Media CEO

Jim Bankoff James Philip Bankoff (born December 23, 1969) is an American media executive who is the co-founder, chairman, and chief executive officer (CEO) of Vox Media. He previously worked for AOL and joined Vox Media's predecessor, ''SB Nation'', in 200 ...

referred specifically to "issues raised by a former employee in a post on Medium" in a statement to employees announcing Steele's termination. Bankoff also stated that Steele had "admitted engaging in conduct that is inconsistent with our core values and is not tolerated at Vox Media."

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Steele, Lockhart American bloggers Brown University alumni St. Paul's School (New Hampshire) alumni Vox Media Living people Year of birth missing (living people) American male bloggers People from Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts Writers from Massachusetts