Turner retires from industry after masterful 40-year career

Continued from page 2 covers 12 counties – Washington, Benton, Crawford, Sebastian, Scott, Franklin, Logan, Newton, Madison, Carroll, Boone and Johnson.

“I am extremely lucky to have worked for WECHO Media for the last 14 years of my career,” Turner said. He believes Hussman has been a visionary with his views on the changing industry and has insisted that “journalism remains the top priority” in the company. “Rusty has provided decades of telling meaningful stories to Arkansas,” said Brent A. Powers, president of the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. “He and his news teams have won many awards from the Arkansas Press Association for their work over the years. Most of all, I’m proud of how Rusty and his team handled the pandemic. During this time, our readers were kept up to date on everything they needed to know about the local community, their health and their safety. I’m sure Rusty’s next chapter will be his best.”

In looking back over his career, Turner notes it first was envisioned when he was in the eighth grade. His parents, natives of Arkansas, had moved to Tulsa and he graduated from high school there. His career focus already formed, he obtained a degree in print journalism in 1983 from the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.

His first job was as a reporter at the Northwest Arkansas Morning News at Rogers, covering news and sports. He moved to the Springdale News as a sportswriter in 1984.

His wife Anita accepted a teaching position in Eastern Oklahoma in 1986, and he began a four-year stint covering sports and then news at the Southwest Times Record in Fort Smith.

It was back to the Springdale News in 1990, working as a reporter with a principal beat at the University of Arkansas. He became editor of the NWA Morning News at Rogers a year later. Then in 1994, the Rogers and Springdale newspapers merged, and he began a role as managing editor under long-time journalist Jim Morriss, who held the position of executive editor.

Morriss retired in 2003 and Turner was promoted to executive editor. By that time, the Stephens-owned newspaper was producing zoned editions for the four major cities of the region. That format continued until what Turner termed the “shocking” agreement between WEHCO and Stephens in 2009. That essentially concluded one of the fiercest phases of what were numerous “newspaper wars” in Northwest Arkansas over the years.

“We had maybe a month to six weeks’ notice,” Turner said. Thereafter, the competing staffs essentially were on the same overall operating team. The previous Stephens group was responsible for local community news and sports (including company-owned weeklies) while the WEHCO journalists were focused on more regional issues, such as the University of Arkansas, Walmart and the Northwest Arkansas Council. The latter also covered the Arkansas Razorbacks sports beat.

Turner said that plan was workable, but some debate often emerged relating to specific news coverage issues.

“At first there was a lot of tension and a lot of stress,” Turner said. “It was very uncertain how all that was going to play out.” He said journalists able to “put aside those old competitions” successfully moved forward as a positive and productive team.

“I learned a lot about myself and how to build professional relationships,” Turner said. “I am really proud of how these things eventually shaped up. We were able to develop strong journalism and a strong company.”

Turner has been amazed at the massive growth of his home region. He started work in Rogers (where he has lived since 1991), when the population was 18,000. The city limit sign now reads just under 70,000. “And that number is a few years old,” he said.

The city with the most dramatic level of change is Bentonville, where his wife grew up. Turner said the high school ritual for her older sisters was “cruising the downtown square” and stopping in at the Dairy-O.

Those days are long gone.

“Bentonville is now a really eclectic and cosmopolitan place,” he said. Of course, that includes the Crystal Bridges and Momentary museums and the headquarters of the world’s largest retail company. New residents are arriving from all over the country and from around the world.

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