Remembering business journalist Karen Blumenthal

Bre Bradham of the Duke Chronicle writes about business journalist Karen Blumenthal, who served as chair of its board and also worked at The Wall Street Journal but died last week at 61 from a heart attack.

Bradham writes, “Blumenthal and Scott McCartney traveled to Duke frequently this past semester to co-teach a business journalism class in Duke’s DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy.

“In 2009, the Center recognized Blumenthal with the ‘Futrell Award for Outstanding Achievement in Communications and Journalism,’ which is presented to one alumnus each year.

“Bill Adair, director of the DeWitt Wallace Center and Knight Professor of the Practice of Journalism and Public Policy, said he views the Futrell Award as a lifetime achievement award, though recipients often go on to keep doing great journalism after winning it.

“‘It was given because of the extraordinary body of work that she had done, even by that point—and that was early, before she had written many of the books that she went on to write,’ said Adair. ‘So it just speaks to all she had done in the first chapter of her career.’

“The final WSJ byline of Blumenthal’s career came long after she began writing books full time.”

Read more here.