The Life of VERMONT CONNETICUT ROYSTER II
Vermont Royster was born in Raleigh on April 30, 1914 and died on July 22, 1996, at the age of 82. He graduated from the University of North Carolina, where he was editor of The Daily Tar Heel. He joined the staff of The Wall Street Journal in 1936. With time out for military service, Royster worked for the Journal and its publisher, Dow Jones, Inc., until 1971 when he left to teach at UNC for eight years until his retirement in 1979. Royster won two Pulitzer Prizes, his first in 1953 was for editorial writing and the second in 1984 was for his column, Thinking Things Over, which he wrote while at the Journal and continued at UNC until 1986. In 1986, President Regan presented Royster with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The National Press Club gave him the Lifetime Service Award in 1978. Royster was a charter member of the North Carolina Journal Hall of Fame; was president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors; served as president of UNC’s General Alumni Association; and was a trustee of St. Augustine College. Royster served in the US Navy during World War II. He was on convoy duty in the Atlantic and later served in the Pacific as commander of a destroyer escort.
