Duane Howell, a longtime Avalanche-Journal reporter and editor whose analytical columns on cotton and farm policy appeared in publications around the world, is being remembered for his impact on the agriculture industry after he died May 27.
He was 95.
The West Texas native’s knowledge of the agriculture industry ran deep. Howell grew up on a dryland cotton and grain sorghum farm in Lynn County south of Lubbock, according to his obituary provided by Resthaven Funeral Home & Memorial Park.
He studied agriculture at Texas Tech three years, quit a year to farm his granddad’s place, returned to Tech and graduated with a bachelor of arts degree in journalism in 1953.
He was sports editor of Texas Tech’s La Ventana yearbook during his senior year.
Howell was a farm reporter at the Abilene Reporter-News for four years before he moved to Lubbock and became farm editor of The Avalanche-Journal in 1957.
He retired from the A-J in 1996, but his regular, highly-nuanced freelance columns on the cotton industry ran in the Avalanche-Journal and other publications for decades.
Howell also wrote cotton articles for DTN Progressive Farmer from 1980 through 2024, according to his obituary. He also owned and managed dry-land and irrigated farms in Lynn County.
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Longtime A-J farm editor, West Texas cotton writer Duane Howell dies
Reporting by Adam D. Young, Lubbock Avalanche-Journal / Lubbock Avalanche-Journal
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