William Burl Blankenburg

1932 - 2023

William Burl Blankenburg

Feb. 10, 1932 - Jan. 1, 2023

William Burl Blankenburg, professor emeritus of the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Journalism, died January 1, 2023, in Palo Alto, CA, at the age of 90. In his nearly 30-year academic career at the UW, Prof. Blankenburg instructed thousands of undergraduate journalism students, advised countless master's and Ph.D candidates, and published original research and books in the field of newspaper economics and the societal effects of mass media.

Bill was born February 10, 1932, in Sioux Falls, SD, to Beryl Irene (Caffrey) Blankenburg and Edmund Ferdinand Blankenburg, and grew up in nearby Beresford, SD. After high-school graduation in 1950, he enrolled at South Dakota State University in Brookings. He suspended his studies in 1953, to enter the U.S. Army and served in West Germany as a clerk in a unit of the Corps of Engineers, before being honorably discharged as a Corporal and returning in 1955 to South Dakota.

During his college summers in South Dakota, Bill worked for the state Department of Transportation as a photographer, traveling by car to take scenic photographs for tourism purposes. In 1951, while visiting the capitol building in Pierre, SD, he met Patricia Jane Porter, a local high-school senior working as a tour guide. He photographed her in her cowgirl-inspired uniform the day they met, and a long-distance courtship ensued, only to be interrupted by his Army service. The couple was married on August 16, 1956, in Pierre.

With opportunity and family connections on the West Coast, Bill and Pat moved to California in 1957, settling in Mountain View and Palo Alto - the area that would soon become Silicon Valley. Bill found work as a photographer, reporter and editor at The Town Crier, the community newspaper in nearby Los Altos, and enrolled at Stanford University, earning a master's degree in mass communications in 1958. Pat worked as an administrative assistant at Hewlett-Packard until their son, Andrew, was born, in 1961.

In 1963, Bill's growing interest in a teaching career led him to pursue a one-year appointment as a journalism instructor at Colorado State University, and the family relocated to Fort Collins. Returning to California in 1964, Bill resumed his editorial and photography career and returned to Stanford University's Communications Department to formalize his higher-education teaching credentials. He earned his Ph.D there in 1968. A teaching offer from the University of Wisconsin followed, and the family moved to Madison in the summer of 1968. His career in Madison would continue another 29 years and encompass every level of instruction within the J-School, from introductory-level undergraduate reporting classes through doctorate-level coursework and advising. Many former students, including prominent journalists, remember Bill as their first editor.

During his tenure, Bill headed the news-editorial sequence in the school's undergraduate program and was a frequent public commentator on the economics of newspapers and ethics in the press. Bill was an influential researcher in newspaper economics, often gathering previously overlooked data on the pricing of journalism products that became frequently cited by prominent scholars.

In the classroom, Bill was known by students and faculty for his fierce standards in teaching reporting and photojournalism, his blunt and exacting instruction style, countered by a stealthy, bone-dry sense of humor. In addition to his published academic titles on the subject of mass media and society, Bill's playful side led him to write and co-design cultural and social parodies, from send-ups of regional poetry to satires of Victorian-era manners and etiquette. Through his retirement years, he self-published volumes of photography informed by his ironic eye.

After retiring from teaching at Madison in 1997, Bill and Pat relocated a final time to Los Altos in 1999. Shortly after Pat's death in 2010, Bill moved to the Channing House retirement community in Palo Alto.

Bill is survived by his son, Andrew Blankenburg; and daughter-in-law, Kathy Adelmann, of Clarendon Hills, IL; and three grandchildren: Grace Blankenburg, of Chicago, Julia Blankenburg and Sam Blankenburg of Clarendon Hills.

A private memorial service will be held by the family.

Memorial contributions may be made in Bill (and Pat's) name to the nonprofit musical organization they supported for decades: The Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestra, 17 Applegate Court, Suite 10, Madison, WI 53713.