Tom Torok

Lifelong journalist Tom Torok was a tireless reporter and editor, a popular mentor and a highly respected, trailblazing data journalist of the highest caliber.

He died in Camden, New Jersey, on March 6, 2022, after a brief illness. He was 73.

Torok was a natural-born teacher, in high demand at the countless sessions he conducted at IRE and NICAR conferences and in classrooms across the United States, Ukraine, Russia and Kyrgyzstan.

Ukrainian journalists had a special place in his heart.

In an interview in 2018, Torok said he once heard someone say that the Ukrainian people's best hope for freedom was a free press.

"I can't think of anything better to do than to help toward that end in some small way," he said.

During his newspaper career, he worked for seven papers.

At The New York Times, Torok created and managed the paper's data journalism team, which helped bring home eight Pulitzer Prizes during his 13-year tenure.

Before that, he was a columnist and reporter for 18 years at the Philadelphia Inquirer, where he was part of four teams that were Pulitzer-Prize finalists, three for the Public Service award.

He also worked at newspapers in Florida and New York.

Torok's work in the field of data journalism was legendary. He began working with punch cards in 1973 and was a pioneer in developing data analysis programs. He readily shared what he learned with journalists everywhere. He worked with IRE member Derek Willis to open source a program he called "shboom" that could make a database web-searchable quickly through pull-down menus and clicks.

"It's very difficult to overstate how much of an impression this made on us when we first saw it in action," Willis tweeted after learning of Torok's death.

Torok later created applications to turn free text into searchable data.

After he retired in 2013, he continued to serve journalism by speaking at conferences and teaching. He served on the board of the nonprofit Nikolaev Center for Investigative Reporting, among others, and visited with Ukrainian journalists several times in person, then went virtual during the COVID pandemic.

Torok graduated in 1966 from Carteret High School in Carteret, New Jersey, and served nearly four years in the U.S. Air Force. He then earned a bachelor's degree in psychology from Florida State University and went on to become a newspaper reporter and start his journalism career.

Known for his sense of humor, he was fond of touting what he said might still be his world record for riding in a commercial clothes dryer. He also liked to say he was a "pretty good shot" at pool and often told a story about playing with world champion Steve Mizerak.

"He was very friendly and gave me tips to help me shoot the best game of my life," Torok said. "For six seconds, I had bragging rights that I was beating a world champion. Then he proceeded to pound me into the ground."

Torok was married to fellow reporter Cece Lentini in 1982. They have two children: daughter Elena Torok and son Stephen Torok.