Former
press agency journalist Ken Loran, who was northern editor of The Daily
Telegraph during the technological upheavals of the 1980s, has died.
The
72-year-old was taken ill on the two-week cruise in the Mediterranean
to celebrate his wife’s 70th birthday, and died in hospital in
Gibraltar.
Loran, who lived near Wilmslow in Cheshire, was
northern editor of the Telegraph when production moved from Withy
Grove, Manchester, to an out of town site at Trafford Park.
He
began his career with an Urmston, Manchester, press agency after
service in the RAF and worked for a number of publications, including
the Bolton Evening News, before joining The Daily Telegraph’s
Manchester office as a sub-editor in 1959.
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During his retirement
he wrote several books, including There Was A Time, an account of his
childhood growing up in Salford, and he served for a spell as a
Macclesfield councillor.
He also launched the Macclesfield
Community News, a free, monthly newspaper, with his journalist wife,
Margaret, and business partners.
Loran was one of the kindest journalists anyone could be asked to work with and was a professional of the old school.
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He had a real understanding of people and how to get the best out of his staff.
Under
his editorship, he introduced weekly pages with the heading of Looks
North in order to maintain the paper’s northern flavour in the face of
a more London-based bias as the result of modern high tech production
methods.
Reporters, feature writers and photographers roamed its
circulation areas in the north of England and Scotland to find
exclusive stories and pictures.
They were even sent abroad with
the military to the Falkland Islands, Germany, Hong Kong and Belize to
file stories and pictures of regional interest.
Loran leaves his wife, a son, Mark, who lives in Canada, a daughter, Heather, seven grandchildren and one great-grandchild.
A funeral service was held at Macclesfield Crematorium followed by interment at Alderley Edge Cemetery.
John Williams, Space Press News and Pictures
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