William J. Tobin: a voice of the times: fifty-seven years in journalism, and an eye for news.

• Author: McCorkle, Vern C.
• Position: Junior Achievement Special Report

For 30 years, William J. (Bill) Tobin served as an editor and executive of The Anchorage Times. During his tenure at the top, the newspaper came to be known as Alaska's state newspaper. And indeed, taking up his duties just four years after statehood in 1959, Tobin's character and vision helped to shape the future business, economic and civil destiny of the new 49th state for decades to come.

But Tobin didn't begin his 57-year journalism career at The Times. Eighteen years earlier, the then-young Tobin had his introduction to "getting out the news" by the Associated Press, when in 1946 he engineered his way into the post of an AP copy boy in Indianapolis, Ind. One year later, he was promoted to stall writer. Then in late 1952, he was transferred to New York City where he joined AP news-features at the wire service's Rockefeller Center headquarters.

Two years later, he was named AP regional membership executive for Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky, based in Louisville, Ky., where he served until transferred to Juneau in the late summer of 1956. There, as the AP's Juneau correspondent, he began his long Alaska career and opened the first full-time wire service bureau covering all of Territorial Alaska. In this position, he directed all AP coverage in The Great Land during its last two years as a territory and the first two years as the 49th state.

He was recalled briefly by the AP to serve as assistant bureau chief of operations in Maryland and then bureau chief in Montana. Times Publisher Bob Atwood asked Tobin to return to Alaska in 1963 as managing editor of the newspaper, a position he held for the following 10 years.

It was during those years that Tobin made some of his most influential contributions to the development of Alaska through his encouragement of business and economic expansion. The trans-Alaska oil pipeline was constructed, followed by enormous growth of the new state's population and commerce. In those days, the newspaper was a mighty force for community and regional leadership, not to mention positive political change. Then in 1973, he became associate editor and general manager of The Anchorage Times, after which, in January of 1985, he was named vice president and editor in chief.

After the purchase of The Anchorage Times by Bill Allen, he served as assistant publisher and editor of the editorial page until the paper was purchased by the Anchorage Daily News. Upon cessation of the Times' operations, he joined Allen as senior...