Categories: OLD Media Moves

Bancroft member who sold WSJ dies

William Cox Jr., a senior member of the Bancroft family that sold The Wall Street Journal to News Corp. in 2007, died at 82, according to people close to the family.

Martin Peers and Stephen Miller of The Journal write, “Mr. Cox, who spent his career at The Wall Street Journal as an advertising and client relations executive, was a longtime supporter of preserving the independence of the paper’s parent company, Dow Jones & Co.

“‘It has been in the family for a long time,’ Mr. Cox told a Journal reporter in 2007. ‘I want to see it stay in the family,’ he added.

“He later appeared to change his mind, however, telling the Journal he was ‘leaning toward a sale.’

“The deal went through in the summer of 2007, closing later that year when News Corp., led by Rupert Murdoch, paid $5 billion for the company, a 67% premium above the share price when the offer was announced.”

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.