Thomas N. Schroth

Thomas Nolan Schroth (December 21, 1920 – July 23, 2009) was an American journalist who specialized in coverage of inside the Beltway politics as editor of Congressional Quarterly starting in 1955 and then establishing The National Journal in 1969 after he was fired from CQ due to policy conflicts.

Schroth was born on December 21, 1920, in Trenton, New Jersey, together with an identical twin, Raymond. His father, Frank D. Schroth, was publisher of the Brooklyn Eagle. He attended Dartmouth College and enlisted in the United States Army Air Forces immediately after his graduation and served for three years during World War II. He had started his career as a reporter at Time magazine and United Press International. He joined his father as a reporter at the Brooklyn Eagle, and was on its staff until its demise in 1955 in the wake of a strike by The Newspaper Guild, having served as the paper's managing editor in the last three years of its existence. Following the paper's final issue on January 29, negotiations in June coordinated by Schroth to sell the name and associated goodwill of the Eagle to the publishers of The Brooklyn Daily were unsuccessful.

He was elected in October 1955 as executive editor and vice president of Congressional Quarterly, a publication established in 1945 by Nelson Poynter, publisher of the St. Petersburg Times. Schroth built the publication's impartial coverage of the United States Congress, with annual revenue growing during his tenure from $150,000 when he started to $1.8 million. In addition to adding a book division, Schroth added many staff members who achieved future journalistic success, including David S. Broder and Elizabeth Drew. He was fired from the Congressional Quarterly in 1969 after festering disagreements with Poynter over editorial policy at the publication and Schroth's efforts to advocate "more imaginative ways of doing things" reached a boil.

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