Alfred Balk
July 24, 1930 - November 25, 2010

ALFRED BALK HUNTLEY, Ill. - Alfred Balk, formerly of Muscatine, died of cancer at his home in Huntley, Illinois, on November 25, 2010. Balk served as an editor at four national magazines, wrote more than 100 magazine articles and seven books, co-edited an eighth, and served on the faculties of Columbia and Syracuse Universities. He was born July 24, 1930, in Oskaloosa and grew up in Muscatine and Rock Island, Illinois, where he entered journalism as a high school sports reporter for The Argus newspaper. From the mid-1960s through the early 1990s, he served as feature editor and editor-at-large of the Saturday Review, the second editor of the Columbia Journalism Review (where he also served as general manager), founding editor of World Press Review (which was sponsored by the Stanley Foundation of Muscatine), and managing editor of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers' Spectrum magazine. From 1975 to 1976 he delivered media commentaries on CBS Morning News. In the 1960s, four of his articles were especially influential. Confessions of a Block-Buster (1962) in the weekly Saturday Evening Post exposed a pseudonymous speculator (Norris Vitchek's) techniques for exploiting housing segregation. After a homeowners group sued to compel disclosure of Vitchek's identity in Baker v. F amp;F Investment, the case made legal history when a U.S. District Court upheld Balk's right to confidentiality, and the Supreme Court in 1972 let the decision stand. Also for the Saturday Evening Post, he and Alex Haley co-authored the first nationwide report on Elijah Muhammad's Nation of Islam. At Balk's suggestion, the article, Black Merchants of Hate, later led to Haley's classic and bestseller, The Autobiography of Malcolm X. For Harper's, a 1964 collaboration with then-Senator Paul Simon (D, Ill.), The Illinois Legislature: A Study in Corruption, spurred ethics reforms and vaulted Simon to national prominence. Simon was later elected a U.S. Senator. Another Harper's report, God Is Rich, on religious organizations' tax exemptions, led to a 1968 book by Balk on the subject. For The Reporter, in Mr. Johnson Finds His Market, he analyzed the success of Ebony and Jet magazine founder John Johnson as a social milestone. In When the Wind Blew Black Blizzards for The New York Times Magazine, he reported on the Dust Bowl's recovery. In ensuing years, he wrote book reviews and op-ed pieces for the Times. In 1966 Balk moved to New York as Feature Editor of Saturday Review, where he also served as an Editor-at-Large. Subsequently, he became the second Editor of Columbia Journalism Review, where he was also General Manager and taught at the School of Journalism. Over four years, he converted the Columbia Journalism Review from quarterly to bimonthly publication, co-edited a 10th anniversary anthology for Little, Brown, and produced a business plan for future acceptance of advertising. He left Columbia to serve as Founding Editor of World Press Review, a monthly foreign press digest. The Stanley Foundation of Muscatine, then headed by his former scout leader, sponsored the publication, which initiated programs such as an International Editor of the Year Award. World Press Review observed its 30th anniversary with the May 2004 issue, its last printed issue. Its title became a website. His last magazine position, from 1989-91, was Managing Editor of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers' award-winning IEEE Spectrum. He left that to join the faculty of the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, from which he retired in 1994 and later moved to Huntley, Illinois. Born in Oskaloosa on July 24, 1930, Balk grew up in Muscatine and Rock Island, Illinois, where he entered journalism as a high school sports reporter for The Argus. After a year at Augustana College and graduation from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University (BSJ, MSJ), he served in the U.S. Army in Chicago and Japan, where he began freelancing for magazines. In 1958, following a year as a Chicago Sun-Times reporter and two years in public relations for the J. Walter Thompson Co., he began freelancing fulltime until his move to New York. During a career-long emphasis on media improvement, he: - Served on the Twentieth Century Fund's task force that established a National News Council, for which he wrote the paperback A Free and Responsive Press - Consulted for the Ford Foundation and the John and Mary Markle Foundation - Served as secretary of Gov. Nelson Rockefeller's Committee on Employment of Minority Groups in the News Media - Produced the film, That the People Shall Know: The Challenge of Journalism, narrated by Walter Cronkite for Sigma Delta Chi (now the Society of Professional Journalists), which awarded him its Wells Memorial Key. In 1969, he was elected President of the Society of Magazine Writers. His writing on media has appeared in Nieman Reports, Columbia Journalism Review, Editor and Publisher, Folio, and other journalism publications. In 1975 to 1976 he also delivered media commentaries on CBS Morning News. He served as treasurer, Executive Committee member, and judge for the National Magazine Awards for the American Society of Magazine Editors; Board member and Awards judge for the Overseas Press Club; president of the Society of Magazine Writers (now American Society of Professional Journalists and Authors); and, among other posts, faculty member of the Bread Loaf Writers Conference and President's Fellow at the Aspen Institute. Other books he authored include The Religion Business, The Free List: Property Without Taxes, The Myth of American Eclipse, The New Global Age, and Movie Palace Masterpiece: Saving Syracuse's Lowes' State/Landmark Theatre, The Rise of Radio, From Marconi Through the Golden Age. In addition, he co-edited Our Troubled Press and collaborated with Irv Kupcinet on Kup's Chicago: A Many-Faceted and Affectionate Portrait of Chicago. Balk's scholarly papers are in the collections of the Newberry Library in Chicago and Syracuse University. He was a longtime member of The Century Club in New York. He is survived by his wife, Phyllis Balk, of Huntley, Illinois; two daughters, Laraine Balk Hope of Rockville, Maryland and Diane Balk Palguta of Indianapolis, Indiana; two grandchildren, Anna and Andrew Palguta; and a sister, Virginia Pickering of Fullerton, California. A Memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. on Friday, December 3, 2010, at the First Congregational Church of Huntley, 11628 E. Main St. where the family will greet friends from 10 a.m. until service time. Contributions can be sent to Hospice of Northeastern Illinois, 405 Lake Zurich Rd., Barrington, Ill., 60010 or The Newberry Library, Al Balk Memorial, 60 W. Walton Sr., Chicago, Ill. 60610 or The Huntley Area Public Library, 11000 Ruth Rd., Huntley, Ill., 60142. For more information, call DeFiore Jorgensen Funeral Home at 847-515-8772.

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