Charles Apple

Here’s wishing the happiest of VizEds birthdays to Paul Wallen, assistant managing editor for design and sports at the Kerrville Daily Times.

Paul started out as a journalist for the U.S. Navy in the late 1980s. In 1991, he became sports editor of the Marshall, Texas, News Message. In 1994, he was named graphics editor of the Evansville, Ind., Press. He became design editor for a chain of suburban papers near Chicago in 1996.

He was a designer for The Virginian-Pilot from 1997 to 1999 and then for the Lexington, Ky., Herald-Leader from 1998 to 2000. He was design editor of the Baltimore Sun for three years before being named managing editor for visuals for the Lewiston, Maine, Sun Journal. Under Paul’s guidance, the Sun Journal earned an incredible 22 awards in the 2007 Society for News Design contest. Paul’s young protégé, Megan Lavey, won six herself.

Paul leaped over to the west coast to be a sports designer for the San Diego Union-Tribune for a year before heading to Ft. Lauderdale in 2007 as design director. He spent nearly two years at the Sun Sentinel, overseeing the paper’s massive redesign last fall.

Paul was laid off in March by the Sun Sentinel but then hired shortly after by Kerrville. He’s been there a little over two months. Paul turns 41 today.

Paul shares a birthday with actors Geoffrey Rush, Sylvester Stallone, Della Reese, Janet Leigh, Ned Beatty, Gregory Smith and Burt Ward; musicians Bill Haley and Curtis James Jackson III (”50 Cent“); comedians Jennifer Saunders and Pat Paulsen; TV giant Merv Griffin; religious leader the Dalai Lama; former first lady Nancy Reagan and former president George W. Bush.

In addition, today is National Fried Chicken Day. Seriously.

Best wishes, Paul, for the happiest of birthdays! Enjoy!

This entry was posted on Monday, July 6th, 2009 at 6:13 am and is filed under Happy birthday. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.