Remembering Alan Adler, FreightWaves journalist and mentor

Alan Adler, an award-winning journalist who worked for The Associated Press, the Detroit Free Press and FreightWaves, died Friday. While at FreightWaves, Adler served as Midwest bureau chief and was a fixture in coverage of automotive, autonomy and emerging truck technologies.

He created the Truck Tech newsletter and podcast, regularly interviewing industry leaders, and was a leader in reporting on the Nikola truck saga.

Before joining FreightWaves, Adler had a decadeslong career that spanned The Associated Press, the Detroit Free Press and later 20 years of domestic and international media relations and executive communications at General Motors. In 2017, Adler left GM to start his own communications company before joining FreightWaves in 2019.

In 2025, Adler retired from FreightWaves but continued to mentor and was an invaluable resource to the writer who took over his reporting beat. At press pools and conferences, Adler was well known among both media and automotive executives.

His experiences at General Motors put him at the forefront of emerging technologies like autonomy, which he would later cover on his trucking technology beat. window. googletag = window. googletag || {cmd: []}; googletag. cmd. push(function() {googletag.

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push(function() {googletag. display('div-gpt-ad-1709668545404-0'); }); Adler’s dedication to service and helping others extended outside of journalism. In addition to being well known for his extensive baseball card collection — many of which were visible during his interviews — Adler was a fixture in the community through his volunteer work and outreach.

He was a man of faith, serving as a church elder, Bible study fellowship group leader, coordinator for Financial Peace University classes and a volunteer for the blight relief organization Life Remodeled in Detroit.

He also helped distribute food with Forgotten Harvest and spent weeks helping with disaster relief efforts in Haiti and Iowa with Samaritan’s Purse. His commitment to serving others extended to his family. His obituary notes he often brought his children Storm, Joel and Mark along with him as he served. Retirement from FreightWaves did not stop Adler.

He continued to maintain a twice-weekly Meals on Wheels route while helping Love in Action of the Tri-Cities by filling local pantry orders and picking up donated food from local retailers. He represented Love in Action at the Grand Haven farmers market and delivered food backpacks to elementary school children.

For those close to Adler, baseball was one of his loves. He was a dedicated Cleveland Guardians fan, a passion that began during his time at the Cleveland AP bureau. Behind his desk were collections of baseball cards from his extensive collection. He completed a prized set of 1958 Topps baseball cards shortly before his cancer diagnosis in February 2026.

His memorial noted that monitoring his fantasy baseball scores remained important even up to his last days in hospice.

Adler is survived by his wife of more than 35 years, Deborah Adler; three children, Genevieve “Storm” Adler, Joel Adler and Mark Adler; sisters Alice (Paul) Plybon and Kathleen Zimmer (Dave McKeon); niece and nephews Trish (Cliff) Moody, Chip (Monika) Plybon and Zachary (Chelsea) Zimmer; and great-niece Evelyn Zimmer.

He was preceded in death by his parents, Leonard (Dolores) and Marjorie Adler, and brother-in-law Thom Zimmer. Thoughts are with the Adler family. Alan left a lasting legacy of service to others and commitment to journalistic excellence. window. googletag = window. googletag || {cmd: []}; googletag. cmd. push(function() {googletag.

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