Dolph C. Simons Jr.

Chairman, The World Company; Editor, Lawrence Journal-World

Dolph Simons Jr. has been a director of the Associated Press; president of the Kansas Associated Press board of directors; director of the Inland Daily Press Association; director and president of the Kansas Press Association; trustee and board president of the William Allen White Foundation, which works to promote the journalistic ideals of the former Emporia, Kan., newspaper editor; and a Pulitzer Prize juror. He served as a director and board secretary of the American Newspaper Publishers Association (now Newspaper Association of America). He also is a former director of the Newspaper Advertising Bureau Inc.

Under his leadership, the World Company, headquartered in Lawrence, Kan., was until October 2010 one of the most integrated multimedia companies in the nation. At that time, the company sold its broadband division and is now focused on print and digital communication activities.

[KS-E 0101] - Epiphany LXXXIX: Editor & Chairman: Dolph Simons, Jr., The Lawrence Journal-World (3:07)

Dolph Simons realized the importance of the newspaper business on a quiet Sunday, Dec. 7, 1941. He was a 7-year-old at his grandfather’s house for Sunday dinner when war broke out. Before the day was done he was on the streets of Lawrence, Kan., hawking an extra edition of his grandfather’s Lawrence Journal-World.