William Burl Blankenburg, professor emeritus of the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Journalism, died on Jan. 1, in Palo Alto, California, at the age of 90.
Born Feb. 10, 1932, in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to Edmund Ferdinand and Beryl Irene (Caffrey) Blankenburg, he grew up in nearby Beresford, South Dakota. After graduating from high school in 1950, Blankenburg enrolled at South Dakota State University in Brookings but suspended his studies in 1953 to enter the U.S. Army. He was honorably discharged in 1955 and returned to South Dakota.
He married Patricia Jane Porter on Aug. 16, 1956, in Pierre, South Dakota, and the couple moved to California the following year. Blankenburg found work as a photographer, reporter and editor at The Town Crier community newspaper in nearby Los Altos, and he enrolled at Stanford University, where he earned a master’s degree in mass communications in 1958, and a Ph.D. in 1968.
In the summer of 1968, Blankenburg moved with his family to Madison to accept a teaching position at UW. In his nearly 30-year academic career, he 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.
After retiring from teaching at Madison in 1997, Bill and Patricia relocated to Los Altos in 1999. Shortly after Patricia’s death in 2010, Bill moved to the Channing House retirement community in Palo Alto.
