James B. Boone, Jr.
Published 1:30 pm Tuesday, August 12, 2014
Boone is active in group and individual management for Boone Newspapers Inc. (BNI), lives in and works from Tuscaloosa, Ala. BNI’s first newspaper acquisition was made in 1970 while Boone was publisher of The Tuscaloosa News. The News was published by Boone’s father, Buford Boone, a Pulitzer Prize winning editor, from 1947 until 1968 when he was succeeded by his son. The Boones operated The News through a family-owned company that leased the newspaper’s franchise and certain assets from Public Welfare Foundation until 1981. Prior to becoming publisher of The News, Boone was publisher of The Suffolk (Va.) News-Herald, then owned by the Carmage Walls and Gene Worrell organizations and prior to then did newspaper management work for Walls in Georgia and Texas. Boone’s newspaper background is news, advertising, circulation and production. He is a graduate of the University of Alabama.