He was a 1997 Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting, sharing the honor with several staff reporters for a Tribune global examination of overpopulation.
EVANSTON, IL, March 16, 2023 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Storer H. "Bob" Rowley has been included in Marquis Who's Who. As in all Marquis Who's Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected on the basis of current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.
Leveraging more than four decades of excellence in metro, national and international journalism for outlets in the Chicago area and nationally, Mr. Rowley has earned distinction as an award-winning foreign correspondent and respected writer and national editor at the Chicago Tribune -- where he covered presidents and prime ministers, politics and economics, wars and natural disasters, and human interest stories in more than 50 countries. That experience helped him later as an impactful adjunct lecturer for the Medill School of Journalism and the School of Communication at Northwestern University. From 2012 to 2020, he focused his efforts on managing media relations, marketing and crisis communications as director and assistant vice president of Media Relations at Northwestern. Since 2014, he has been teaching graduate and undergraduate classes at the university. His courses range from international reporting, national politics and coverage of Israel and the Palestinians, to content and influencer marketing, which highlights the mechanics and promotion of digital content, online networking and web analytics. Mr. Rowley is a contributing writer for Washington Monthly and writes occasional commentary for the Chicago Tribune, as well as other publications.
Outside of his primary career efforts, Mr. Rowley serves on several boards, including as the founding president and chair of the Mentoring Committee for the Master of Science in Communication Alumni Association at Northwestern University. He has been a director on the board of the Chicago Headline Club Foundation since 2021, where he manages the application review committee that awards the Club's annual Les Brownlee Memorial Scholarship to a rising student journalist. Additionally, he is Vice President and executive officer on the board of the Association of Foreign Press Correspondents USA (AFPC-USA), where he oversees committee work aimed at helping protect journalists and free expression at risk around the world. Also dedicated to civil society, he has served as a volunteer for the Night Ministry with St. Matthew's Episcopal Church and also as Warden and a member of the Vestry at St. Matthew's, helping with finances, public relations, vision and discernment committees from 1999 to 2016.
Mr. Rowley began his career as a street reporter, rewrite person, broadcast editor, and beat reporter at Chicago Police Headquarters and the State of Illinois, and finally, assistant city editor, for the legendary City News Bureau of Chicago from 1976 to 1979. He also worked as a newswriter for WIND-AM NewsTalk Radio in Chicago. He then joined the Chicago Tribune in 1979, serving in several roles including reporter, rewrite desk and weekend Metro Desk editor in Chicago before heading in 1982 to The Tribune's Washington, D.C. bureau to cover the Pentagon and The White House. Later he served as a national correspondent based in Dallas and covering the Southwestern U.S., and as a foreign correspondent for 12 years based in Mexico, Canada and Israel. He served as a member of the Editorial Board at the Tribune for four years, responsible for foreign affairs and defense issues, and as national editor of the newspaper for seven years, overseeing the work of numerous correspondents and national bureaus and helping manage the news and politics report from the Washington Bureau, until 2009.
That year, he became the executive director of government and community relations for Elmhurst College outside Chicago, lobbying for student funding and for health and science education funding in Springfield and Washington, D.C. In that role he hosted an Illinois gubernatorial candidates' debate broadcast on public radio, helped bring in notable speakers for cultural programming and joined the Elmhurst Rotary Club. He then was named director of Media Relations at Northwestern University for the department of University Relations from 2012 to 2017 and later served as assistant vice president of Media Relations for the Office of Global Marketing and Communications for Northwestern University from 2017 to 2020. He oversaw a team of writers, videographers, social media and Web experts, who told the story of the University, its students, research and impact, across multiple platforms to external and internal audiences.
Prior to embarking on his professional journey, Mr. Rowley earned a Bachelor of Arts in English and American literature and French language from Harvard University in 1976. He then attained a Master of Science in Communication from Northwestern University in 2013. Among his professional accomplishments, he was a 1997 Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting, sharing the honor with several staff reporters for a Tribune global examination of overpopulation illustrated by struggling families who continue to bear children they cannot afford. He also earned several other awards for his work as a foreign correspondent, including winning the 1996 Overseas Press Club's Madeline Dane Ross Award for the best foreign reporting showing a concern for the human condition, for the same series on why people have children they can't afford to raise. He also was named one of 40 National Semifinalists in 1986 in the Journalist-in-Space Project run by NASA, which was put on permanent hold after the space shuttle Challenger disaster. Within the coming years, Mr. Rowley intends to focus his efforts on writing, teaching, helping less advantaged journalists and working to support, promote and protect journalists at risk globally, and to advocate for evidence-based reporting, press freedom and free expression. He also plans to travel, continuing to foster his unyielding interest in the world.
Mr. Rowley is married to Carolyn Lesh Rowley (June 15, 1985), who worked for UPI and AP in the U.S. and in Paris, TIME Magazine in Washington, D.C., the Dallas Morning News in Texas, the CTV television network in Toronto and WTTW-TV Chicago Public Television during a long and distinguished journalism career. They have two daughters, both born in Mexico City: Mary Kathryn Rowley (b. 1987) and Elizabeth Storer Rowley (b. 1988).
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Since 1899, when A. N. Marquis printed the First Edition of Who's Who in America®, Marquis Who's Who® has chronicled the lives of the most accomplished individuals and innovators from every significant field of endeavor, including politics, business, medicine, law, education, art, religion and entertainment. Today, Who's Who in America® remains an essential biographical source for thousands of researchers, journalists, librarians and executive search firms around the world. Marquis® now publishes many Who's Who titles, including Who's Who in America®, Who's Who in the World®, Who's Who in American Law®, Who's Who in Medicine and Healthcare®, Who's Who in Science and Engineering®, and Who's Who in Asia®. Marquis® publications may be visited at the official Marquis Who's Who® website at www.marquiswhoswho.com.
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