The Town Talk - Notable Staffers

Notable Staffers

• Ira Wallace Anthony (1936–2010)— wire services editor and copy editor from 1963 to 2007

• James R. Butler, Jr. — former managing editor

• William F. "Bill" Carter (1928–1995)—sports editor in second half of 20th century

• William Chaze — city hall and regional reporter, later Associated Press editor in Washington, D.C., senior editor for U.S. News and World Report

• Jeff Cowart – press secretary to former Governor Buddy Roemer, later consultant in Washington, D.C.

• Nelder Dawson (1928–2006) - advertising manager and director of personnel; company employee for fifty years

• Helen Derr (1918–2011) — religion editor, 1955–1977

• Michael P. Dunne (1949–2007) - later environmental reporter for the Baton Rouge Morning Advocate

• Sue Eakin (1918–2009) - historian and columnist

• Ronald R. Grant – former regional editor and editorial page editor

• Chanan Gerald Hambleton (1935-2012) - Town Talk reporter, president of Alexandria Press Club, and later news director for KSYL Radio and a consultant for the Rapides Parish Police Jury

• Tom J. Hardin – executive under Joe D. Smith, Jr., and publisher under Central Newspapers

• Chet Hilburn, reporter, later with Houston Chronicle, author of The Mystique of Tiger Stadium: 25 Greatest Games: The Ascension of LSU Football (2012)

• Ethel G. Holleman (died 1979) – women's editor in 1960s and 1970s

• Leandro S. Huebner — senior photographer; on staff since 1973

• Cleo Joffrion — first African American reporter, 1975

• Adras LaBorde (1912–1993) - managing editor; total career spanned 1945-1977; wrote "Talk of the Town" column

• John LaPlante (1953–2007) - later political reporter for Baton Rouge Morning Advocate

• James Henry "Jim" Leggett — former political reporter and editorial page editor

• Elizabeth Roberts Martin – first woman in an editor's position; named president of the Louisiana Press Women in 1974

• Marilyn Miller - later industrial public relations representative in Minden and the author of Sons of Darkness, Sons of Light: A True Crime Story based on a crime in Webster Parish on Christmas 1916.

• Rebecca Jo Tubb Mulkey (1949–1999) – features writer

• Len Sanderson Jr. – first director of Town Talk's Baton Rouge bureau, 1974; chief of staff to Governor Roemer (1988); later a business consultant

• George W. Shannon (1914–1998) – later the editor of the since defunct Shreveport Journal

• Cecil Williams (1922–2008) -- business editor and columnist; on staff, 1955–1987