William S. “Bill” Humphries, 85, former senior news editor in North Carolina State University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and agricultural jounalist, died Sept. 6.
Humphries worked two stints in agricultural information for N.C. State, retiring in 1986. For 21 years, he was farm editor for the Raleigh News & Observer.
He was the first president of North Carolina Farm Writers and Broadcasters, an organization still in existence today, and served as president of the Newspaper Farm Editors of America.
He earned many awards for his work in agricultural journalism. The N.C. Farm Bureau and N.C. State Grange and others cited him for his commitment to agriculture.
On three occasions, Humphries was cited as the outstanding newspaper farm editor in the U.S. In 1983, the N.C. Seedsmen’s Association named him “the North Carolina Agricultural Journalist of the Half Century.”
— Natalie Hampton
