Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist John Noble Wilford received the BS in journalism from UT in 1955 and the MA in political science in 1956. His career in journalism began in 1956 with a post as a general assignment reporter for the Wall Street Journal. He was with Time and joined the staff of the New York Times as a science reporter in 1965.
He has won two Pulitzer Prizes. The first, in 1984, was for his national reporting of science topics. In 1987 he shared the prize with other Times reporters for their team achievement in reporting on the Challenger explosion and its aftermath. He is the author or editor of eight books and has been a visiting professor at Princeton, Syracuse, Duke, and Yale. He served as the 1989–90 Chair of Excellence in Science, Technology, and Medical Writing in UT’s College of Communication and Information. He was the recipient of the Westinghouse-American Association for Advancement of Science Award.
He is a member of the Alumni Academic Hall of Fame and received an honorary doctorate degree from UT Knoxville at the spring 2014 commencement of the College of Communication and Information.