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It’s not the first time Cooke’s quit the Sun-Times. He was editor in chief from 2000 to 2004, when he quit to become editor in chief of the New York Daily News. That job didn’t work out and Cruickshank brought him back to Chicago in 2005 as vice president, editorial for the news group — meaning top editor of every paper but the Sun-Times itself.
Cruickshank and Cooke were summoned to Chicago from Vancouver in 2000 by then publisher David Radler to run the Sun-Times together. The world turns quickly, and in the past nine years Radler has resigned under fire, pleaded guilty to corruption charges, served a prison sentence, and been released. Cruickshank left Chicago in 2007 to become publisher of the CBC. He was succeeded as publisher of the Sun-Times by his boss, Cyrus Freidheim, board chairman and CEO of the Sun-Times Media Group, which is the corporate remnant of the Hollinger newspaper empire that Radler had built up with Conrad Black (who’s still in prison).
