The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
The Spokesman-Review Newspaper The Spokesman-Review
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883
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Rob Curley

Rob Curley

Current Position: Executive Editor

Rob Curley is the executive editor of The Spokesman-Review and joined the newspaper in 2016. He has previously held leadership positions at The Orange County Register, Las Vegas Sun, Washington Post and Lawrence Journal-World. His work in newsrooms, dating back to the 1990s, resulted in some of the largest and most award-winning news sites on the internet, but local journalism and community engagement have always been the main focal points of Curley’s work. He has started several, large-scale community initiatives through the newspaper — including the Northwest Passages events series and the largest, paid high school newspaper internship program in the country. During his time, the newspaper has become a national leader in philanthropic-funded journalism and the use of Creative Commons. This alternate funding has allowed The Spokesman-Review to become the smallest newspaper in the nation to have a bureau in the nation’s capital, to continue to have a bureau in Olympia, WA., covering statewide issues and politics, and — with one of the nation’s largest Ukrainian populations in the nation — The Spokesman-Review was one of the smallest news organizations in the world to send a reporter to Ukraine to cover the war with Russia through the eyes of its own community. In 2023, the news nonprofit Curley founded -- the Comma community journalism lab -- received its 501c3 status from the Internal Revenue Service, and helped relaunch the region's Black newspaper, The Black Lens.

Email
robc@spokesman.com
Phone
(509) 459-5590

All Stories

Opinion >  Column

Rob Curley: What exactly is a Jayhawk? Or a Zag, for that matter?

When you’re a college basketball fan who grew up in Kansas and now lives in Spokane, some questions are inevitable. Here are two: Your friends in the Pacific Northwest want to know just what in the heck a Jayhawk actually is. Those back in the rectangle state would really like to understand what in the world a Zag is.

Who wrote that opinion? Going forward, you’ll know the answer

Opinions have played a huge role in American newspapers, dating back before the Revolutionary War. It was this country’s desired independence from British rule that first showed the power of newspapers to unite people for a common cause.
News >  Spokane

Letters of thanks to The Spokesman-Review

When you’re a newspaper editor, you get a lot of email, notes and phone calls. I’ve worked at some of the biggest newspapers in the nation and never received as much as here in Spokane. It’s actually one of the coolest parts of working here – people care. And they’re chatty. Those are features, not flaws.
News >  Spokane

Local journalism truly belongs to all of us

Two years ago, an anonymous philanthropist in Spokane worked with the Innovia Foundation to start a new fund at the non-profit entitled the “Community Journalism and Civic Engagement Fund.” The stated goal of the fund was to create and host local events that would bring the Spokane-area together in multiple ways that would encourage people to engage with their community.
Rob Curley
Opinion >  Column

Rob Curley: Look to us for news, not risk to your health

A newspaper gets used to the idea that some people – mostly bad people – are afraid of us. But not our readers. And definitely not this time. We were told about a handful who recently canceled their subscriptions out of fear of this virus. Both the WHO and the CDC say it is safe to receive packages, including newspapers, at your home.
News >  Spokane

Rob Curley: Following a Spokane bachelorette’s journey

While most people are deathly afraid to speak in public, there aren’t many microphones or large audiences Katherine Morgan isn’t completely at home with. Still, she might seem like the most unlikely person in Spokane to appear on the live, stage-show version of the popular television show, “The Bachelor.” Yet, there she was Sunday night.
News >  Spokane

Rob Curley: Adding more comics and puzzles still a great idea from 1954

Sometimes the lessons you learn when you’re just a kid don’t truly resonate until you’re much older. For generations, the first time many experience a newspaper is when they discover the simple joys of comics page somewhere around the time that they’re learning to read and tie their shoes.
Opinion >  Column

Rob Curley: Making hoops history under the Pavilion’s new lights

There are so many examples of Gonzaga’s game-changing moments that many folks can rattle them off with almost no thought. There’s Casey Calvary’s tip-in against Florida in 1999 that launched one of the longest continuous NCAA Tournament streaks in all of college basketball. It almost seems like yesterday, except no current Zags player had been born when Calvary was shattering backboards on national TV.