Melissa Argueta, award-winning media marketer at Newsday, dies at 51

She had nicknames for everyone she knew, told stories that could’ve been episodes from Seinfeld and answered the phone at 2 a.m. to listen to a friend’s problems. And she once backpacked across Ireland — though she would have rather stayed in nice hotels — to see the world with friends.

And she made the journey in part because she hoped to cross paths with U2 frontman Bono, since she was a huge fan.

Along the way, Melissa Argueta became a national award-winning media marketer at Newsday, where she’d worked since 2014, honored with awards from Editor & Publisher, the American Advertising Federation and the International News Media Association for branding campaigns including FeedMeTV and Faces of Long Island — the latter of which also led to multiple Emmy nominations.

But lifelong friend Dodie Gillett, of Huntington, said Wednesday that the lasting legacy of Melissa Argueta is this: "Melissa made friends everywhere she went. People liked her."

Argueta died Saturday in her Huntington home following a sudden medical episode. She was 51.

Her sister, Jackie Argueta, of Manhattan, said Wednesday that doctors believed her sister was stricken with a pulmonary embolism.

"Melissa was an extremely valued member of our Newsday family. She was known for her dedication and professionalism, and she cared about Long Island and Long Islanders," Newsday Publisher Debby Krenek said. "Her presence will be deeply missed at Newsday."

Newsday Media Group Marketing Director Royston Wilson said Argueta played a key role in Newsday’s branding and marketing efforts, specifically promoting features and lifestyle coverage, as well as fostering awareness through the Newsday Journalists campaign, audience engagement initiatives, sweepstakes, contests, special publications and NewsdayTV promotions that included the redesign of "Time to Eat."

As Newsday project manager Rich Forestano, who’d also worked with Argueta at the Nassau-based Anton Media Group, said: "Newsday’s a big company, but it’s also a small company — and she was very much part of the fabric ... I never had a sister, but if there was anyone I’d call on for that role it would have been Melissa." 

The youngest of three children, Argueta was born in Dix Hills on Aug. 23, 1973. Her mother, Marion, grew up in Queens and was an accomplished painter. Her father, Robert, born in El Salvador, was a civil engineer educated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) who spoke five languages and headed projects around the world.

Argueta was an inquisitive child. She loved travel, wrote poetry, dabbled in art and studied screenwriting at New York University, spending a semester in London and traveling around Europe. She went to Central America, where her brother has a coffee plantation, and traveled across the United States, especially Hawaii, where she, her sister, brother and mother one year even gathered to celebrate a Thanksgiving, Jackie Argueta said.

"She was brilliant, had a creative mind, and she had the gift of comedy," Jackie Argueta said. "She could tell a story like nobody else. And her impersonation of a mob boss? She was a Seinfeld and Larry David fan and she would cite clips all the time: Summer of George, Yada Yada Yada."

Gillett met Melissa Argueta in seventh grade French class at Oldfield Middle School in Greenlawn. The two were 13.

Over the years, Gillett and Argueta went to clubs, ferreted out coffee houses, traveled and attended more than 1,000 concerts.

 "Part of our connection was music," Gillett said, "but it was also that we were both single — and we bonded over trying to find somebody. She was a spiritual person, with a belief in God. But she was also always up for something."

There was California, stuck in a cabin with a tarp roof during a freezing rainstorm. And the hostel in Ireland, where they'd failed to understand first-come, first-serve accommodations — and found themselves roaming the streets with friends at 4 a.m. There was the train in the wrong direction — ending up in some seaside town without a place to sleep.

"She just knew how to make people smile and feel good," Gillett said.

In addition to her sister, Jackie, Argueta is survived by her brother, Benjamin, his wife, Esther, and their daughter, Kathleen, all of El Salvador. She was predeceased by her parents. Visitation is 3-6 p.m. Thursday at the Nolan Funeral Home in Northport, with a funeral Mass at 10 a.m. Friday at Our Lady Queen of Martyrs Church in Centerport. Interment is at the Northport Rural Cemetery.

By John Valenti

john.valenti@newsday.com

John Valenti, a reporter at Newsday since 1981, has been honored nationally by the Associated Press and Society of the Silurians for investigative, enterprise and breaking news reporting, as well as column writing, and is the author of “Swee'pea,” a book about former New York playground basketball star Lloyd Daniels. Valenti is featured in the Emmy Award-winning ESPN 30-for-30 film “Big Shot.”