Tulsa World biz editor Walton leaving paper

Rod Walton, the business editor and energy reporter of the Tulsa World, is leaving the paper.

Walton is going to PennWell Publishing in Tulsa to be senior editor for Electric Power and Light and PowerGrid magazines. He will also help develop content for conferences.

Walton writes, “Some years ago, my in-laws had a magnet on their refrigerator warning, ‘Don’t believe the liberal media.’ Thanks mom and dad in law. Pundits, meanwhile, would have you believe that the media are a bunch of left-leaning, ravenous pack wolves.

“I’m a pretty conservative guy, but these people I’ve had the honor to work with are pure salt of the earth. Family-oriented, hard-working and fun-loving. They have political convictions, both on the right and left, but hardly the liberal shills punditry would have us believe.

“Another thing I’ve learned in covering business: Mitt Romney was right. Corporations are people. They are jobs and passions, the fulfillment of the American dream. Surely that dream is tottering, even though it’s still the ideal. I hope CEOs and shareholders will keep that in mind.

“What makes me think that? Directly in front of me is a crew of young people who have come to work for a newspaper even in the face of the industry’s so-called collapse.”

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.